WordView -The Chaos Around All of Us
By Jacob Dwyer
Through our WordView series, a small group dives into the hidden meanings behind words to better understand how we perceive the world and what implications that may have for how we interact with one another. Our discussion of chaos unearthed some unique insights to demonstrate once again how our identities and experiences shape our worlds.
What is chaos?
In discussing how we perceive chaos, some of these different perceptions began to unearth themselves. For some, chaos is a feeling of helplessness where myriad things are happening simultaneously while you struggle to keep your head above water. For others, chaos is a state where all the rules are broken, leaving you with a deep uncertainty of what will come next. Other participants rather saw chaos as this dynamic state of change, where there are inherently multiple opportunities available to you borne of the uncertainty. Our concept of chaos also depended on our exposure to it. Some participants mentioned moments where they felt as if in a state of chaos. Some mentioned moments where they may have been surrounded by chaos but not as impacted by it. Others could not recall a moment they would describe as ‘chaotic.’ For many, it was easier to think of moments that were chaotic when thinking about forces at play larger than ourselves, such as the actions of governments at the international level, than moments in our personal lives.
How do we manage chaos in our lives?
In order to better understand our reactions to chaos, we focused on moments each of us had determined as ‘chaotic’ to examine our reactions. One constant in our descriptions of chaos was a state of complexity, where there are intertwined and interdependent relationships between multiple factors and actors. One decision will impact all the others, purposefully or inadvertently. During a recollection of these moments, we coalesced around a natural desire to narrow chaos’s complexity and focus on steps forward. It is difficult for us to hold all of this complexity in our heads, and many of us felt a natural inclination to avoid the stress and find a ‘pathway out’ of the chaos. This narrowing helps us to not feel overwhelmed by returning to us a feeling of agency in our choices.
However, in determining a pathway, we have to prioritize our options, as well as the consequences of those actions. These decisions are usually based upon our values, which are largely informed by our perceptions, communities and culture. And since these are influenced by systemic forms of oppression, like racism, patriarchy and classism, implicit biases can easily inform our “way out” of chaos, especially when we are making decisions quickly. Our perspectives cause us to see (and simultaneously be blind to) certain identities to inform a ‘black and white dichotomy.’ However, without an appreciation of the gray, we can often misstep.
For example, the West’s united front against Russia’s war in Ukraine has somehow trickled down to an Italian university’s administration canceling a lecture on Russian author Dostoevsky to “avoid controversy”. We draw connections between visible identities (Putin is Russian and so is Dostoevsky) and immediately make assumptions of what the “right” decision is. However, by ignoring the gray (the Russian Empire arrested Dostoevsky for reading and discussing banned books) we risk losing valuable perspectives that can lead to a more informed response. It is suspected that this same narrowing of complexity is what could be leading to the exponentially increased violence against Asian Americans, especially women, in the USA since COVID.
How can we keep complexity front of mind, especially in chaos?
One way we can keep this complexity in mind is actually be focusing in on ourselves. In thinking about chaos, those of us with connections to math remembered Chaos Theory, which states that seemingly random and complex systems are actually underpinned by regular patterns, interconnectedness, fractals, and self-organization. The most well-known example of this is the “Butterfly Effect.” Chaos Theory postulates that even the flap of a butterfly’s wing in Brazil can lead to a tornado in Texas. Everything on Earth is interconnected, even though it may seem completely random to the naked eye.
In adapting this theory to our own lives, we discussed how it actually grounds us in our communities. Our actions have a direct impact on our environment, including the people with whom we interact. An while these interactions can seem random, each present an opportunity to affect the prescribed pattern that underlies them all - the pattern being systemic exclusion that has persisted for centuries. By approaching these interactions with an open mind and heart, we saw it as an opportunity to not only gain further insight into others’ experiences, but also allowed us to practice living in this complexity by daily recognizing the interconnectedness we have to everyone around us. By keeping this complexity front of mind and constantly seeking new perspectives from those around us, hopefully we can approach the next bout of chaos with a wider and less biased perspective.