The Story is Told
The story is told of a day when Sherlock Holmes and his assistant Watson, went camping. Sometime in the middle of the night, Sherlock woke up, leaned over, and asked Watson,” What you see?” Watson responded,” Sherlock, I see the North Star, which is helped guide us to this spot. Beyond that I see the Big Dipper and the tail of Orion. I also can make out the edges of the Milky Way and I know that there are universes expanding beyond that.”
As Watson was about to continue his rapturous explanation, Sherlock elbowed him and hissed, “Watson, you idiot, someone has stolen our tent!”
Why This Should Matter to You
Why am I sharing this story with you? Because it illustrates the power of perspective—or one’s point of view. You see the world through the lenses of your own perspective— which is the combination of your environment, family, genetics, culture and everything you’ve ever done. It’s from this perspective that you view the outside world. In fact, you could say that the inside colors the outside. Your internal world is what determines what you see out there. The bigger your perspective, the more you can see and enjoy.
How Your Perspective Affects You
In the story about Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Sherlock’s perspective had him focused on the crime while Watson didn’t even notice the crime but instead revels in his glorious new view of the heavens. You know, we can think that we’re all grown up and have a great perspective, but more often than not we’re like children camping in a tent with our flashlights thinking were brave adventurers, but we haven’t even left our own backyard.
I believe every human in one way or another is limited by their own perspective. Our perspectives tend to be fragile—limited and limiting. And while we’re usually comfortable with our current perspectives (at least most of us are), these comfortable perspectives are keeping us from seeing a much grander view of the universe.
Whether you wear glasses or contacts, or your eyes work just fine, imagine for a moment, what would it be like to put on someone else’s glasses and then try driving to your local store. I believe this gives us an illustration of how our perspectives—which we often feel very comfortable with—can actually make life very challenging. It’s just that we are used to it being that way. I invite you to consider having the tent of your limited perspectives “stolen” away.
So often we see the world around us through the perspectives of our family, our countries culture, the culture of our social group or even the culture of our workplace or industry.
See The World From a New Perspective
Many times when people invite us to see the world from a different perspective, we resist. What is it that we’re really resisting? What is it that you resist when offered a new perspective? I invite you to consider letting go of the fact that someone might be stealing your tent and instead focus on the possibilities that can come to you from an ever expanding view as you learn to see things from new perspectives.
So ask yourself this question: How big is my tent? How big would I like it to be?
For additional ideas on changing your perspective, I invite you to read the following: It’s The Inside That Colors The Outside