What Can Force You to View The World - In A New Way?

I recently read Robert Jackson Bennett's fantasy murder novels - Shadow of the Leviathan Series. It is a nicely written series that makes you think. First, two books are out, with the next one supposed to be released in April 2026. As an avid reader, there are many things I love about books apart from the books themselves. During this time, I realised that one of the reasons I love books is that they make me ponder and help me introspect without consciously thinking about it. As I read, I get into the characters and feel with them; sometimes, what they believe and say resonates with me. That, my dear friends, is nothing less than Magic. Sometimes that happens with these blogs, too. I write them immediately, and then people comment on them with their lens. And I realise that everybody reads and interprets the exact words through their own lens.

Just remember the things you say about others say a lot more about you than it does about them..

This series is about two administrators trying to solve murders in an apprentice-master framework. At some point in the book, the master tells her apprentice the one thing she hesitated on before selecting him: "Those who have never been hurt, never watched the wicked go away unpunished…" I am paraphrasing that part of a sentence as I cannot recall the rest. For some reason, when I read that, I wrote it down - and hence the blog. Once you see the truth at any level, it changes you. You cannot help it - you cannot unlearn what you have learnt. Maybe that's why the saying - 'Ignorance Is Bliss.' I remember the first time I realised that my mind constantly talks like a radio. Now that I know I can never forget that, I may lose awareness of the fact for a few hours or days, but it always comes back to me. If you have lived a life where everything was 'good', you were punished if someone did something wrong. If rules were broken, there were consequences. So, when for the first time something you know is bad is not punished but allowed to happen, your veil of innocence drops away. From then on, you never see the world the same way - you start to protect yourself in case the wicked go unpunished. You learn to take everything around with a pinch of salt. You realise that maybe in some cases it is ok to believe that the other party is guilty until proven innocent. However much you do not want to live that way, you cannot help it.

So many things begin to change when you come at the world from that perspective of more than one right answer.

Now, I am not debating the rightness or wrongness of something. After all, history is a prime example of how interchangeable those two are. At some point, it was perfectly acceptable for one human to keep other humans as enslaved people. It was understandable why women did not need to be educated, work, or have a vote. At some point, polygamy was the only model of family life. So, I do not think I am the judge of what is right and wrong, but rather the point is that once you discover a layer of right/wrong which did not exist before in your worldview, your point of view begins to shift irrevocably. Then there is no going back - maybe that is the definition of growing up. In some ways, it is accepting the reality as it is, as Byron Katie says - we all believe that people should be kind to each other, love each other, take care of each other, etc. But, is that true? Then by believing they should - what are we doing? Rejecting reality as it is because it does not match the reality in our heads. Sometimes, life breaks that illusion and leaves us with no choice but to accept that people are not always friendly to each other. People do not care about climate change. People are selfish.

Most of the growth happens when we realise that the world has always been this way - it is just that our worldview did not match the reality. Slowly, we adjust our worldview and look at the world through a new lens. Now, do you take it to the extreme and believe that nobody cares about each other, or do you do the inner work to be ready to make the call every time and accept that you may be wrong - that's when real change happens within. And with that, it starts to ripple outside as well.

Can you remember the life experiences that changed how you look at the world?