81 - Close-mindedness

My friend, Sarah, and I are at the Hong Kong Central Library and as she's currently leafing through books on the Cold War, I'm taking this opportunity to write today's post while she works.

Sarah seems a little paranoid and thinks I might be writing about her. She's asked me whether or not I'm writing about her cold sores or her boots or perhaps the way she searches for books. To be honest, I do take issue with the strolling around the library searching for the book because that's what the Dewey decimal system and the library catalogs are for. I mean, right now, I could just as easily write about her swinging her arms as she walks, the way she tiptoes to reach books on higher shelves or perhaps the way she crouches or squats to reach books on low ones. Personally, I do those things too, but much more quickly... when nobody is around... because I'm weird like that.

But anyway. Nah. I won't write about her, but she does serve as inspiration for today's idea.

One thing I've always admired about her is the fact that she always has an opinion on everything, i.e., she's never at a loss for words. Like me, she gets how it is to have a versatile taste in different areas of life and you can always count on her to speak up about something or be open-minded enough to listen to you.

There are many people I know that lack this quality. They're narrow-minded and too comfortable with being just comfortable all the freakin' time. They're happy to be another sheep in the herd and find the black sheep (me) very unsettling. A guy like me can obviously communicate with them, and can understand their points of view, but when it's the other way around, I can't tell them anything because they either wouldn't know what to say or wouldn't want to say anything. They don't care that they're ignorant, and they don't hate the fact that they are small in this world. They don't want to know or have more because what they know and have now is decent enough and they'll turn their backs on any opportunities they might have to learn something new.

I have grown from being the baby born in Hong Kong to the teenager that just loves to expose himself to more and more. I want to travel the world in the future, be a forensic anthropologist, a doctor, a Hollywood writer... I give every television show and movie a chance just for the chance to learn something new. I'll try any food, I'll read any book, magazine, comic or blog. I blog because it's a great way to meet people. I don't dislike any of my subjects at school, say it's boring or "stupid", just because it's new, just because it's difficult.

I don't give up and I like learning at school, and in life, and I think that close-minded people are missing quite a lot by being content with their experiences and knowledge that they have already. People who lack flexibility in their breadth of view and rigidly adhere to their own life need to give the wider world a shot.

This doesn't just apply to my friends and me and my little life in Hong Kong.

On a far greater scale, close-mindedness, lack of tolerance, and unwillingness to take in other ideas is the major instigation of war and political upheaval nowadays. I'm no expert, but take the Cold War as an example: communists and capitalists, both unreceptive to each other's different approach to dealing with the economy, cause a death toll that's still being counted now (does anyone have an estimation?).

Library closing, have to end here. Close-mindedness, do you hate it too?