By: Saranye Iyer

“Oh, that’s how we do things at home. It is happening since my grandmom’s generation”

“Oh, they both are same. Birds of feather flock together, isn’t it? They have the same thinking”

“Do you know what that girl said? No wonder, that’s how she is conditioned”

“A child said that! I can’t believe. That is how he is conditioned. All thanks to the upbringing”

We all know how all of the above statements point to the conditioning and the effect of mingling with same perspectives. A perspective doesn’t have a defined lifespan. It might die an early death or it may live to see many generations. So clearly, a said perspective definitely has a cradle but need not necessarily have a defined period to be able to meet its grave.

But there are ways to change your perspective and outlook. Indeed there are!

Perspectives live under the roof of conditioning. Conditioning is a big umbrella under which a set of perspectives are grouped together.

Time and again, we associate conditioning to the behaviour of people and their ideas. There is good conditioning and there is bad conditioning, they say. But it sits deeper than just categorising it in two.

Lets understand more about bad conditioning.

What is bad conditioning? Can we delve more into it to understand it better?

I would say bad conditioning is when the exposure to a certain set of people becomes so limited and remote that they do not get a new perspective different from their own and that leads to a one kind of conditioning, and further make them thrust the same on their children or on their families. And what happens? As Virginia Woolf puts it in her novel ‘To the lighthouse’, “For one’s children so often gave one’s own perceptions a little thrust forward.”

More often, that perspective results in a behaviour or thinking pattern that doesn’t contribute to any good or even becomes harmful to the society they live in. That sort of conditioning is bad or I would call it as unsafe. Unsafe because, the people dwelling in that conditioning, have an ability to pose harm or threat when they come contact to a mindset different from their own. The weaker set might get influenced by this sort of people. I would partly disagree to that statement because these people are very rigid and rigidity doesn’t encourage them to accept other’s thought process. They live in their own cocoon of hubris towards their approach of seeing things that they seldom entertain new and renewed mindsets. Also, it will take lot of time and energy for this ilk to unlearn their conditioning and upbringing and welcome a change in their perspective.

Change your perspective – Know ways to do so

What are the techniques with which one can introduce a new perspective or unlearn their current perspectives?

1. Introspect: See within you before reaching to anything else. It is very important to look within yourself and reflect. What is your reaction towards something, how do you behave to a group or people, Do the people mingling with you draw a positive aura from you, are you ready or open to learn new approach? Ask these questions and reflect on your answers. Not only that, introspection is good but acting on the reflections is way powerful. This exercise is a pre-requisite for all the other techniques and once we are open to do an introspection, then others will course through your system.

• Read – “Reading gives you a better perspective”.

Reading is powerful. We all agree to it and are in same page with that phrase. By reading, not only your language or grammar skills get a boost, but the churning happens within you. That churning will concoct new theories, new perspectives, growing a fresh stream of thoughts inside you. Once reading penetrates inside you, nothing can stop it from growing inside you. And with every phrase, text or voluminous books/journals/research papers you read, your current mindset, that which you have grown up with will get a makeover.

• Travel – Travelling is opening doors to welcome new thought process and that is new perspectives. Travel is partly like reading. Reading enables you to imagine and through imagination, you converse with the characters and experience the pleasure of travelling to a new place or era. Travelling is all of that but for a ticket price. Jokes apart both works intimately in providing resources to change one’s mindset or attitude towards life or people.

When we travel, we see new people or a new culture, listen to the stories of the people inhabiting that area, experience the pain-points and pleasure-points making you empathize with the people in that area. A new perspective is born right there.

• Socialise – Meet your friends but meet different set of friends. And make sure you have friends with different perspectives and outlook. Even if ‘Birds of same feathers flock together’ is true in every sense, that doesn’t lead to your growth. You will have the same conversations day in and day out and there will be no challenges and healthy growth in your trajectory of life. Welcome new people in your life and make yourself open to face those people. Only through new people and people with different perspectives and interests will assure you to break free from your age-old beliefs and stereotypes. Only then you will sit and parse your perspectives in minute detail. A person having culinary, art, books, animals and many other interests should be welcomed in your life and through them you will be taught to have a different attitude towards your life or people in your life.