Deeply Understanding Another Person

The deepest understanding we can get of a thing is by creating it. The one who really understands it is its creator. Anyone else has a lesser understanding of it. Religion agrees: The creator knows it all; we should believe in, follow, and trust them. Science agrees; if we cannot create it, we don’t really understand it. The really curious person, the one who wants to understand, has to create.

We create by doing. It is all creation consists of. Every time we do, we create. Consider what we mean when we describe someone as having a creative mind. It is this person’s ability to do, in a circumstance, in which a person with a non-creative mind wouldn’t know what to do. Or consider someone who has never been to or has only visited a country a couple of times. They can’t possibly understand its culture as deeply as a local can. This isn’t because they have spent less time observing or experiencing it but because they haven’t participated in creating it. The locals on the other hand are the creators of the culture.

The reason we understand through creation is that we become the thing we create. For example, we will understand ourselves better by creating ourselves, by paying attention and by deciding on what we do. Being intentional in our actions, that’s what meditation, therapy, growing up and maturing is about. The truth is, the things we do are who we become.

Ultimately, we can’t understand another person unless we have created one ourselves. By this I don’t mean making a baby but having done things that created us. The more similar what we have done is to what someone else has done, the better we will understand them. To understand a wider range of people we have to have done more of what they have done. And if we only do things that are unique we will necessarily be misunderstood and misunderstand others.

We are the ensemble of all the things that created us. And deeply understanding another person only happens when what created us and what we do and continue to do, is very similar to what created someone else.

I deeply appreciate the feedback Philip, Marko, Claudia, and my dad gave me on a previous draft. Thank you.

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