Sometimes there are these moments in my life when I realize things, like small epiphanies that I ever so slightly receive. Mostly, they are things that I could change in my life that I'm doing wrong. One happened the other day when I was at work. I work in facilities at a campus, which in terms of a ladder, I wouldn't amount to much at all. As I walked in on a little argument between a janitor and the boss, I saw that neither lacked knowledge of what the other did, or the importance that they served. They both seemed so oblivious. The two juxtaposed one another and it got me thinking that they knew not a single thing that the other did in a day.
I can't remember how many times I have absentmindedly said "I know what you mean", because ironically, I rarely do know what they mean. In fact, I think a lot of us make the mistake of saying we understand another's situation, when we barely can grasp the edges of it.
I'm not sure when the phrase became a regular in my vocabulary, but it almost seems to take on the purpose of dismissing someone else's experience. In light of recent events that seem to be the main source of circulation throughout media, I believe it's time we start meaning what we say and try to grasp what others are experiencing. We need to take off our shoes and wear someone else's for just a day. It would help us to see things in a different light, and then perhaps we may be able to grasp other's perspectives and where people are coming from.
This idea of looking through other's perspective isn't a new and genius idea. In fact, writer and author Harper Lee keyed in on this idea when she was writing her book "To Kill a Mocking Bird" in 1960. She keyed in on the idea of walking in others shoes and she choose to show this idea through the race issues that were going on at the time. Urging people to walk a day in the shoes of Tom Robinson, a black man who was suffering from racial prejudice at the time, Lee tried to open people's eyes to the issues that were going on. She used a young girl to show that the youth can help impact this change. Lee took to writing a fictitious novel to try and make sense of the world. She wanted to write a story and teach us a moral lesson, one that could be used in the society she lived in then, and one that could be used in the society that we live in today.
I don't want to say trying to understand people's situations will fix the separation within the people, but I do believe that it will provide us with a better understanding of one another. With understanding often comes appreciation, so I urge you to retire your summer sandals or flip flops and try on something different and walk a day through the soles of another person.
