What is your Window View?

A rainy Sunday afternoon in a beautiful campus on the Western Ghats, a wise man asked a group of people a simple question - What is your Window View?

A series of beautiful words started to flow. Something like - I see a majestic mountain with a sprawling green cover of trees; light, moving clouds that allow the Sun to appear and disappear showering light. Enjoying this light, are kids, playing on the campus ground. Different descriptions such as these although different from one another flowed, essentially talking about "the view outside looking from the inside".

The wise man nudged all to come out with an alternative view. After some pauses and nudges; different sets of views started to come. This time the narrative became "the view inside looking from the outside" - like soft looking sofas, antique furniture, a ticking clock, stacks of books in the library. A slight nudge and some pause led to this "inversion" of the perspective.

Finally someone asked the wise man - What is your window view?.

He said "I see the window and only the window - opaque yellow coloured glass, rectangular wooden frame with varnish, broken glass on the edges". His was the "window view not from the inside or the outside - simply a look at the window itself.

When I heard this from the wise man it triggered many thoughts.

Most of us see one view but on a slight nudge and pause we tend to take the opposite view. This is the so called Invert always invert mental model. The world is full of pairs of opposites. Infact if something apears to be true it is wise to assume the opposite view would make sense too. And such inversions do lead to a fuller life perspective. eg:

• Abundance vs Scarcity

• Independence vs interdependence

• Big vs Small

• Complex vs Simple

• Now vs Not Now

• Consensus vs Contrary

• Know all vs Know nothing

• I vs everyone else

• Deep dive vs Fly high 

• Narrative vs Numbers

• Macro vs Micro

• Moment vs Endurance

• Freedom vs Dependence

However by "viewing the direct window first" perspective - we get more sanity. The shape, size, colour and other details of the window will determine what ultimately we end up viewing from inside or outside.

It is not only about viewing the pair of opposites but also the context.

And we with our strengths, limitations, desires, fears, moods,emotions, feelings, patterns of habits, past experiences, culture, language, etc. are the key context of what happens in our life.

A better window view should be a healthy mix of looking at all three - direct, outside and inside and it better start with the direct view of window itself.

This also reminds me of a very popular quote of an American author F. Scott Fitzgerald

"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function."

I feel like we could re-word this to say:

The test of a first-rate human is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and be fully aware that those opposites are in some fashion orchestrated by himself and still retain the ability to function.