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[sabrinamari]

"Don't mistake the map for the territory."

******

As soon as it comes out of you, it's a map. It's never the territory.

You can't see the territory except *through* the lens of a map.

So the things that we think give us ground, just give us more maps.

So there really is no ground.

That doesn't have to be a problem, but it does mean that I have to be stronger to look at it and integrate it into who I am.

That's what I think today, anyway.

Comments

[jasminewind.livejournal.com]

I do think there are some things for which we can prepare using "maps" but the experience itself is "territory"

"The map is not the territory" is a phrase I use in my childbirth education classes to help people understand that what we do in class is designed to guide them on terrain that will be three dimensional, visceral and *real*, while what we've done in class has been academic, idealized, unemotional and not real. Maps help us become prepared for walking through the territory we must traverse to get to the other side of an experience or a journey but if we confuse our preparation and theory with the lived experience, then we will feel disappointed, frustrated, confused and betrayed when confronted with the actual thing, which will be messy and real.

I think of territory a bit like how I think of Mystery - you can know that it is there but until you have walked through it, you don't really know it.

You know what, I think we're using an idiom to explain different phenomena. I guess that is what idioms are for! :-)

[zammis.livejournal.com]

Must share with my own map-god.

This is unrelated

[jasminewind.livejournal.com]

but you need to know about this guy:
Happiness in this World - Reflections of a Buddhist Physician

http://www.happinessinthisworld.com/2012/04/01/how-to-ask-the-right-questions/#.T3kIqxB5mSM

Re: This is unrelated

[sabrinamari.livejournal.com]

Wow!

"It’s not that we’re incapable of escaping our biases. It’s that it takes effort to do so. Fast thinking, according to Kahneman, which is easy, is also hugely biased. Slow thinking, which is hard, is less so. One key to engaging in slow thinking is to constantly question the conclusions of our fast selves."

This is how I live my whole life: think slowly, ask lots of questions, build and rebuild models.

Thank you. I want to know more about this guy.