Predictability Equates to Stability
In this fluid world with conditions, parameters, expectations, and situations constantly in flux, it would seem to me that one’s positions on anything would also flex and change over time based on this. Yet, when a politician reverses their stance on an issue due to new information, regulations, or negotiations, they are considered to be a flip-flopper or some other derogatory name.
However, to me, the most derogatory minds are the static ones that never change their position in an ever- changing world. Surprisingly, unpredictability is considered a dangerous trait here in the United States. Sure, criminal unpredictability is a bad thing for society, but unpredictability overall is a bad thing?
I can see how from a macro level, one would want to be able to accurately predict the outcome for anything for a variety of reasons, economic and otherwise. This would all predicate on the granular predictability of the individual. But this stifling tool to maintain the status-quo also acts as a wet blanket forcing our faces into the pillow of conformity, destined to experience past pain and hardships in the present even though we do not have to.
I consider the ability to change one’s perspective on an issue to be a sign of intelligence, strength, and a real-time display of one’s ability to understand and react to what is really happening around them. If adaptability is what defines the successful species in evolution, then rational unpredictability based on the actual reality would seem to be a critical trait.
But unpredictability is obviously and unabashedly criticized in just about every way possible. Psychiatrists consider it a danger sign and a sign of instability, even insanity! I think a mind that is completely stable, consistent and unchanging is a mind that is dead. It is a mind that has stopped learning, stopped assessing, stopped calculating and has become an irrelevant relic frozen in time. It is an ineffective tool to further the species or improve individual lives or that of the entire society.
Rational, thoughtful unpredictability is something that should be striven for, admired, sought after, and prized, not shunned and labeled in a negative manner. The most intelligent minds are also the most open and pliable. They are also the minds that are the best at adapting to the fluid, ever-changing world in which we find ourselves. If one does not find themselves at opposite ends of any issue ever, then they must open their metaphorical eyes to their brain’s atrophy.
To be still is to be dead. To be moving, to be fluid is to be alive. Consistency will slowly change from a beneficial anchor into a fatal deadweight.