Opinions on Everything.

I am changing up my blog a little now. Notice I am going from tales to opinions. Opinions are also tales, but not stories. They are my take on whats going on in the world with my limited background knowledge. I try to be flexible and not have preconceived ideas about everything. Looking at facebook I am aware that what I see is confirmation that my concerns about the world are correct. The person next door will get different information which confirms that their concerns are correct. We need to worry if all we get is confirmation that we are very aware, very correct all knowing humans. Similarly, if we always surround ourselves with friends and acquaintances who think just like us, we are liable to become narrow minded and smug about all our opinions.

The only way to overcome this bias is to read and research from a lot of different sources. Do not be afraid to read a right wing article if you are left wing, and of course visa versa.  No person is totally one way or the other, unless they have been brainwashed. There is also obvious criteria to help us form all our opinions. No beliefs should urge us to harm or intimidate another person. They should not force us to become a xenophobic person. We should recognize that we all want the same things. We want a healthy, happy, fulfilled life for our whole family. We want sufficient education to have a job and home with resources to eat nutritionally and vacation occasionally. To put it better we can look at Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. (It is a motivational theory in psychology comprising a five-tier model of human needs. There are 5 stages:

1st Physiological needs:  air, water, food, shelter, sleep, clothing, reproduction
2nd Safety needs:  personal security, employment, resources, health, property
3rd Love and belonging:  friendship, intimacy, family, sense of connection
4th Esteem:  respect, self-esteem, status, recognition, strength, freedom
5th Self-actualization:  desire to become the most that one can be

Maslow continued to refine his theory over several decades. (Maslow, 1943, 1962, 1987)

ref:
McLeod, S.A. (2018, May 21). Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
Simply psychology:
https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html)

Just because we all need the same things does not mean that we go about achieving them the same way. Some of us differ a little on how to achieve these and some of us differ a lot.