As we all (at least in the USA) have become frustrated and perhaps angered by the continual rock-throwing and blame-mongering by our country’s leadership, I couldn’t stop thinking about how having different opinions, and how having a willingness to strike realistic, rational compromises actually makes us stronger, and creates better solutions to the problems we face.  

We all have very different understandings of, or points of view about an argument depending on our contextual experience with a specific situation – even though we may speak the same language, our interpretation of the words is very much dependent on our previous experiences with similar sets of circumstances [assuming you’ve had them].  It is our responsibility to attempt to explain our contextual experience surrounding our argument [assuming you’ve had them], as well as attempt to understand the contextual reference points of our colleagues (or adversaries) in the conversation.  By the way, if you don’t have contextual experience with a situation, this is where you sit down and listen.

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