Minds Without Borders

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Thank you for this article. We need to remind ourselves that being open minded is a valuable thing and worth protecting.

Excellent article. Personally, I find it a healthy challenge (at times a struggle) to find that balance. For example, it can be good to thoughtfully define seemingly open environments in order glean meaning; as well as filtering-out distractions, and finding (or rediscovering) what's important, and what's of value!

Sounded awfully nice for me and made me big smile. Reminds me of my own childhood.

Oh Margo, that is so beautiful. My biggest mission is to dismantle 'Divide and Rule'. Lets do this !

This article really resonated with me, I feel as though it helped me understand parts of myself. Never did I think about how MY "niceness" left me confused about people. I had always gradually disliked other people the more people I got to know, they never end up being nice people in my book, but maybe they really were just doing what they felt they needed to do to survive. Also, as CockneyRebel had said they could never stick to one style of painting, that is how I feel about music, I could never only listen to one genre. I have music in my playlist to them all. This article really made me think.

That's gotta irk some people out there! Dividing people based on their true character instead of the masks they put on. They probably put a lot of work into those masks.

Great article!

I like people who are nice people, regardless of where they are from. Mean people stink and are to be avoided as much as possible. If I didn't like someone, it was usually because that person was a bully and I was afraid of them. I was different from others my entire life and still am, although these differences aren't so pronounced today as I have grown and changed.

Thanks for writing and sharing this. It resonated with me. The teacher and foot thing reminds me of asking what ashy skin was this weekend with my mother's boyfriend. The boundaries and categories thing I totally get it. There's not some list of instructions you get to help navigate social situations.

If I see something I like it literal. Your thinking outside of the box you didn't know you were in also spoke to me. If I don't have something with me to refer to when doing a project I feel lost and easily frustrated for sure.

I don't judge others on appearance, gender, sexuality etc. And I like to think of myself as open minded but after reading this article I realised that maybe it's because I can't as I don't understand stereotypes. It's difficult for me to judge what someone will be like until I know what they are like. I can't categorise with loose boundaries.

Truly great penmanship, or..you know what i mean. I hope to read more written by you.

Fifasy: your reply labelling Australians i hope you see the irony of what you have done.
I'm a proud part indigenous Australian, i am also a classical music listener, far from been a snob, and did i mention im aboriginal? To me, my country is my god. My aboriginal ancestors go back 60,000 years or more. We kept our country in tact.
It isnt all Australians that care less about the environment. Just the greedy, classless snobs.

Re: full article.
A lamb is safe with a lion who is not hungry, provided it does not look fun to chase. IIRC, A female leopard killed her first Hyena, and then tried to raise her baby. There are blueberry pickers who won't leave their car without a gun, and others who are comfy picking in the same area as a feeding bear. The humans around here frequently attack on sight, even when unprovoked and well-fed, so some animals learn to reciprocate, but they average much less aggressive. There is a very large black bear living near my best friend, but he has never seen it.

Using a long lens and an airplane, a pack of wolves was filmed chasing a herd of Caribou. The crew thought it was a race. Then, one wolf shot ahead, ignoring the herd, and led the rest to a clearing where one old animal had stopped. They then waited patiently for it to die of natural causes. Nature is mostly about co-existence. Humans notice conflict, and some see that as primary, but most of what we do is co-operation.

Agreed that we tend to run low on prejudice. I've always been open minded on race and religion. I was a car nut for decades before I bought one, and then discovered that there was a pecking order according to which car you had. I was in my 50s before I realized that I was a major target of prejudice.

This summarises a great deal of how I feel. Definitely hyperconnected, probably too nice. I need my routine and constraints because there are so many choices out there. I don't share usual social constraints so I have developed my own particular set to make life manageable.
I can't even get along with my own family because they found religion and joined a particular club but can't see how limiting and close minded that is. Why on earth should their choice (and it was a choice, they were not subscribers earlier in life) be superior to anyone elses. Religion is a way of separating people and as such causes more harm than anything else. I didn't read this somewhere, it seems self evident to me, I can't put that knowledge aside and join their club putting people that belong to other ones down. I suspect all religions contain truth because real truth lies in metaphors and religions are metaphoric systems even though most would vehemently deny this, the trouble being that people like to take them literally and ascribe a weighted value to them. 'Mine is the one true metaphor!'
Nor can I stick to just one political party. I can see value in the basis of most parties' ideas (except from the extreme right). In fact most perties want much the same. Just they think their way of getting it is the best way. But there is no best way. Life isn't simply linear with a clear high point to aspire to. There are many mountains and many ways to climb each one.

^^ Spiritual people see our similarities; religious one see our differences.

Good stuff

^^that's an oldie but a goodie