The Archive

In cleaning my house and purging it of various bits and pieces I tend to come across a few things that I want to save, some are just “I want to save the idea” and others are “I want to save the item.”  This is one of those “I want to save the idea.”

Sadly, as the item departs my house, a bit of nostalgia echos through me at it’s loss, but Cognitive Dissonance remains a well documented concept and even well studied.

Cognitive Dissonance is the discomfort one feels at trying to reconcile two contradictory thoughts (cognitions) or in engaging in behavior that conflicts with ones beliefs.  Some have even said that no brainwashed individual has ever been aware of his/her brainwashed condition and when presented with truth, “cognitive dissonance” comes into play.  The brainwashed individual will dismiss truth as far-fetched, outlandish, impossible and even absurd.  To accept it the individual would have to fit the new information into his/her present world view, which would require a dramatic reorientation of her/her mental processes.  It is much easier to simply dismiss the new information as unreliable, unproven, unauthoritive, conjecture, opinion, etc.

It’s a theory that has made me think over the years that I cannot simply dismiss information presented to me because it doesn’t fit comfortably in to the world as I know it.  That the world is larger and grander than I could ever imagine, and that I must constantly question the basis of my beliefs.

In this way, I hope to realize when previous beliefs no longer hold against conflicting evidence and I am ready to change, while others might become “stuck in a rut” and “set in their ways,” I remain agile and flexible to the changing environment of the world.