Pondering Understanding

It is a beautiful and cold Sunday. As I take a break from my weekend tasks, I find myself thinking about how frequently we are misunderstood, or even more, how frequently we misunderstand others. This happens in small increments on a daily basis and then grows to huge and global proportions. I wonder if we'll ever get it right. I wonder if it is even possible.

We do not understand as much as we think we do. We think we are right and others wrong far too often. In striving for peace, we must strive for understanding. Communication is so easily misconstrued.

Especially in these days of e-mail and instant messaging, the lack of the use of adequate words to express emotion can send ambiguous messages, and misunderstanding will lean to the negative before it will lean to the positive. We take many shortcuts, but the written word should not be one of them.

Even in the best writing, it is so easy to misinfer. An excellent piece by Rick Kleffel on NPR's Morning Edition illustrates this beautifully. You can access it HERE.

Thank you for stopping by. Ponder everything. Have a safe day.