Blue and Black and White and Gold
One of the amazing things about the internet is the speed in which things can capture our collective attention. This week’s latest is an ambiguously colored dress. (If you haven’t seen it, I’ve put some reference links at the bottom of this post.) It’s white and gold, or maybe it’s blue and black.
As usual, once the initial viral wave passes, there are the posts that seek to find meaning or wisdom, and perhaps ride the coattails of the mania du jour. I enjoyed this post the most. “No one tells it like it is. We can only tell it like we see it.” It’s worth a read.
What is truly objective? Is there ever something that can only be seen one way?
For religious people, there seems to be so much that we view as objective in our religious and spiritual practice. Anyone more lax than us is not religious enough, and anyone stricter is just crazy.
But is there really such a thing as objectivity? Do things need to be one way or another? What if they are both?
The author of the aforementioned post, Glennon Doyle Melton, mentions the concept of and/both (also discussed, at length, in the book The Spirituality of Imperfection). If we can open our minds and learn to tolerate other viewpoints, we can grasp the possibility that two opposites can both be true. The dress is both blue and black, white and gold. Other religious practitioners serve God in their way, and we serve Him in ours.
One step further: the concept of both/and can be used for how we view and tolerate ourselves. We are both connected and disconnected, sick and well, tolerant and intolerant. We live in the present while we plan for the future.
We allow ourselves to be. We allow others to be. We allow all to be. And we are better for it.
Ms. Melton refers to the concept as and/both, but I’m more used to the term both/and. Which is right?
Maybe it’s both.
Reference links:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/blue-black-white-gold-dress-color-debate-goes-viral/
http://www.businessinsider.com/origin-of-white-gold-or-black-blue-dress-2015-2
http://momastery.com/blog/2015/02/27/attention-peace-teachers-lesson-dress-round-world