How do you reconcile being open-minded and staying firm in your opinions?

[Tristan12]

I've struggled for a while to be overly open-minded. I've been aware of that and I've tried to be more considerate of other opinions and perspectives whenever they are presented to me. Because of that, whenever someone challenges my opinions or perspectives, I put in a lot of effort to consider what they are saying, and I don't assert my own perspectives very much, because I'm trying to be open to new perspectives.

However, I feel like I am always the one trying to consider the other person's perspective, and never the other way around. I find that there are a lot of things I feel strongly about, things that feel very true to me, and when I don't assert my own opinions and perspectives, It hurts me and feels like a boundary violation. I feel like I don't stand up for myself and what I feel is true or right, because I'm trying to be open-minded. Why do I always have to be the one who is wrong, who should be considering other people's perspectives? Why shouldn't other people listen to and consider mine?

I'd appreciate if anyone could give me some advice on how to reconcile this, because I'm tired of people constantly challenging my perspectives and beliefs, and me never upholding or enforcing them that strongly, just because I don't want to be close-minded to what they're suggesting to me.

Edited Wednesday at 09:06 PM by Tristan12

[Ero]

Think of it in "Bayesian terms", i.e you should never be "100%" certain in anything, because then no new information would change your opinion. However, different "priors"/ hypotheses do not stand to equal scrutiny - for example, the idea that God made the universe in 7 days or that the world is 6000 years - there has been consistent evidence of varying origins (biology, geology, history, physics, etc.) as to make these ideas go to 0 in probability. There are of course more complex cases when there is multiple-hypothesis testing for example. Then, it is a question of which one remains after sufficient new information and is simple enough (Occam's razor weighting). 

[Aaron p]

well...you should know this skill is very rare and you will largely be alone with it. most cannot entertain the idea that an opposing party could be correct without subconsciously harbouring underlying motivations that they simply still want to destroy your argument. you possess the rare ability to entertain the possibility that you are wrong. however you should also be open minded to the possibility that some (or many) people around you are just wrong. This is a very real possibility, one that i am discovering for myself. while i know that i deceive myself on a regular basis and that i cannot even tell when it happens, i am also [at a more simplistic, realistic and pragmatic level] aware that a lot of the people that exist around me are just complete dumbasses. and this isint a judgemental statement, its an objective observation of the state of reality for me. It should also be noted that "masters" and great teachers knowers of wisdom must (by logical deduction) have eventually met the same realisation at some point in their journey to being someone who a certain demographic of seekers recognise as someone who possess particular skill in obtaining truth. It perhaps points more to the increased intelligence of the master as opposed to the decreased intelligence of the general population. also, your not going to get very far being a pushover. the reality is that hard headed people with strong dumbass opinions exist in HIGH numbers all around you and notice...you are the only one who can authentically entertain the possibility that they might be right and you might be wrong...but it is this very skill you possess, that makes you 100x more likely to in fact be correct. look at leo...is he being unassertive of what he knows is true in spite of an ocean of morons telling him hes deluded? Study his style, study the style of assertive empaths and skilful epistemologists. the short answer is; people like you have to learn how to anticipate the dumbassery of dunces and love them regardless. (kind of like how you treat children)    

Edited Wednesday at 08:53 PM by Aaron p

[Basman]

You can with certainty defend something you feel certain about while still being open-minded to different views. Being open-minded doesn't mean you have to assume the view of the last person you spoke with. Its more like a sense of curiosity than an obligation in my opinion. An examination of potential truth when presented with new information.

Open-mindedness would be something like agreeing with Andrew Tate on a thing or two while dismissing the rest of his world view as obviously misogynistic. Close-mindedness would be to dismiss anything he says regardless of validity due to a preconceived notion. You can often intuit when something is very biased or lacking in depth of understanding in my experience. Usually I don't give such opinions much weight unless they can present something actually insightful, like the aforementioned example with Andrew Tate.

 

[Hojo]

When you live by others people you deny yourself. Make your opinions stronger than theirs and call them dumb. It dosent matter what you say to anyone. People will respect you more for being an asshole than a pushover. This isn't the realm to worry about others its the realm to assert yourself. I spent 25 years being this way and it will not get you anywhere. You are secretly victiminzing yourself in a hellish realm you cant do that.

Edited Thursday at 12:11 AM by Hojo

[Jacob Morres]

if people are challenging you too much this is probably more-so an exercise with setting boundaries. it's definitely okay not to be open-minded all the time especially if they're making you feel violated 

being open-minded is supposed to be for growth. if you feel people are attacking you more than you're comfortable with i dont think that's a time to be open-minded. it could be a people pleasing tendency i suspect

Edited Thursday at 12:45 AM by Jacob Morres

[Basman]

To add what I previously wrote, being critical of information is adjacent to being open-minded. Being open-minded doesn't mean you assume presented information to be true but that you examine it critically. That doesn't mean you can't know when something is true or false with a degree of certainty. Being close-minded would be to not even engage with information in the first place.

Of course if people are being belligerent then you need to set a boundary for yourself and not engage with them. Your not obligated to entertain morons.

[Princess Arabia]

Go to the blog and read #107.

[Sugarcoat]

Openmindedness could potentially become a close minded mental position where you think being open to different perspectives and not having a firm opinion is automatically superior to having a firm opinion, so watch out for that tendency if you happen to have it. Openmindedness is a great quality, but you wanna be flexible with it, so it includes you having some firm opinions and being closed to certain perspectives (if you have a reason to ofc). Also if you have fears around expressing yourself socially it can hinder your free expression so you want to work to undo that fear, speak despite being afraid of judgement or something, challenge yourself through action by being firm in opinion, express yourself despite fear, and see how you feel. Start somewhere

Edited Thursday at 06:41 PM by Sugarcoat

[Tristan12]

21 hours ago, Aaron p said:

well...you should know this skill is very rare and you will largely be alone with it. most cannot entertain the idea that an opposing party could be correct without subconsciously harbouring underlying motivations that they simply still want to destroy your argument. you possess the rare ability to entertain the possibility that you are wrong. however you should also be open minded to the possibility that some (or many) people around you are just wrong. This is a very real possibility, one that i am discovering for myself. while i know that i deceive myself on a regular basis and that i cannot even tell when it happens, i am also [at a more simplistic, realistic and pragmatic level] aware that a lot of the people that exist around me are just complete dumbasses. and this isint a judgemental statement, its an objective observation of the state of reality for me. It should also be noted that "masters" and great teachers knowers of wisdom must (by logical deduction) have eventually met the same realisation at some point in their journey to being someone who a certain demographic of seekers recognise as someone who possess particular skill in obtaining truth. It perhaps points more to the increased intelligence of the master as opposed to the decreased intelligence of the general population. also, your not going to get very far being a pushover. the reality is that hard headed people with strong dumbass opinions exist in HIGH numbers all around you and notice...you are the only one who can authentically entertain the possibility that they might be right and you might be wrong...but it is this very skill you possess, that makes you 100x more likely to in fact be correct. look at leo...is he being unassertive of what he knows is true in spite of an ocean of morons telling him hes deluded? Study his style, study the style of assertive empaths and skilful epistemologists. the short answer is; people like you have to learn how to anticipate the dumbassery of dunces and love them regardless. (kind of like how you treat children)    

That's true. The challenge for me is that it's hard to enforce my opinions when I haven't spent hours deeply contemplating and deconstructing them, making sure I'm very very certain of everything I'm saying. Even if I did, I can't do that with every single opinion I have. 

Previously I would almost discard my own opinion for the sake of considering another person's opinion. I would still believe my own opinion for myself, but I wouldn't really enforce it, I would put it aside and fully try to consider and take on the perspective of the other person to see how I felt about it. I think putting my own opinion aside so strongly is what's hurting me. I think I should still stick with my own perspective, but be willing to discuss other potential perspectives, and only change my opinion and fully discard my own perspective once I see that another perspective is actually superior.

[Tristan12]

Thank you for your responses guys. I read through them all and they were helpful.