Our model of the world

Everyone experiences the world differently. What is interesting to you might be very boring to your partner. We make our own interpretations of situations we come across, thus creating our own model of the world. Even if members of a family live under the same roof, each of them has his own stories. Though they live in the same house, eat the same food, share the same space, have the same parents, they never live in the same world. We build our own, individual world to live in, formed by our different experiences, judgments, beliefs, values, etc.  

Every second of our lives, millions of bits of information are streaming through our five senses into our minds, but not more than 10 bits get consciously registered. It is said that if we were aware of all of the information that was coming in, we would go crazy. That is why we filter the information. So we really ‘miss’ a lot. Do you recognize this: you consider buying another car and all of a sudden you see this brand everywhere in town? Where were these cars before?

Our model of the world influences our way of perceiving things and our reactions to what is going on. 

I remember that I was once asked to take care of a cute little dog. The whole family was really excited as we were all very fond of dogs. I will never forget the day when Bobby walked in, what a strange little dog that was! Believe it or not, I had never seen such a dog before. He might not have fitted in my concept of what dogs should be: big, happy creatures with nice wagging tails. This one had none of it! Only two huge ears. We were very disappointed when that odd doggy, known as a Jack Russel, came to stay with us, but after some time we got used to him and when he left, he had become the loveliest dog on earth. Since then I recognize these creatures from a big distance and I cannot imagine that there has been a time that I was not aware of these incredible crazy, smart, funny dogs.  

We see what we know and we perceive the world according to our concepts and thoughts. There is so much more that we are not aware of. We create our models, our maps of the world. No two people can have the same map. While we all have the same structure to be able to see, to hear, to feel, it functions differently in all of us. This is the basis for our problems in communication when we try to impose our map upon another person. The more we are aware of this, the better we can direct our communication. Next time when you are confronted with a strange or stressful situation and when you feel that the maps do not ‘match’, it is helpful to remember that you do not have all the information there is.
Learning to recognize the structure of another person's map will allow us more and more to ‘see the world through their eyes’ and that will surely help us to find more answers to the issues we come across.