Context

When I was little- I used to think a lot.

Well. That's not to say that I grew up and stopped thinking. But I had some serious questions that I wanted answered when I was young, I remember spending a lot of time thinking about them. ...Like, a LOT.

There was one concept that I never understood- and that was the idea of "other people". This sounds kind of self centered, but I actually thought of it like that. I realized that my whole world was what I saw, and the way I saw the world, anything that wasn't in my eyesight at the moment couldn't exist. I knew that was kind of funny- why wouldn't people exist when they were not with me? I wanted to see people for who they were, but I had a hard time imagining it.

One of the things I used to do then to try to understand this concept was try to imagine myself as "them". Whenever we were in the car, and I could see the people in cars on the other side of the street, I tried to imagine myself as them. I would look, take in what information about those people as they whizzed by, and place myself there. Where were they going? Where had they been? What was their relationship with the person in the passenger seat? This forced me to get a bigger view of the world- and it boggled my brain. I'll admit, I didn't quite understand it for a while.

Although, this trick still helps me today. Like every other person on the planet, I sometimes get into these moods where I am the center of the universe. They're not actually that fun because when I am the center of the universe, things are usually falling apart. When I get to that point, I just look to other people. Wondering where are they going? Where have they been? Why are they doing what they're doing?

It's a good way to get the focus off...well...me. And honestly- it's a welcome relief.