The Danger of Analysing

We are the generation who are taught time and time again to 'find the deeper meaning'. I can't think of one English lesson I have had in the past few years where we haven't been made to analyse a text until we find the message the author was hinting at when he described a woman in a red dress.

I do get it. Often there are many hidden meanings which people just don't see.

But sometimes, just sometimes we are looking for a message that isn't there. Sometimes we, as humans, just need to accept that nothing more is meant than what is written on the page.

The issue of doing this is we are being taught to keep analysing the different meanings of all these things. Analyse, analyse, analyse. Keep looking until you find another reason.

Not all of us are able to leave that analysing skill in the classroom. Too often does the same thing happen in our daily lives. We are being taught to analyse novels and poems in so much depth so why stop there? Why not use this skill in our daily lives and look so deeply into what someone says that it tears us apart trying to figure out the meaning.

When your friend mentions one habit of yours that annoys them why not take it to mean they are debating their friendship with you and wondering how much more annoyance they can take before they want out.

Most of the time it's totally irrational which makes explaining it to others very difficult. How does someone explain that a simple 'morning' instead of 'good morning' affected their whole day and made them think they were in the wrong for something?

Whether we realise it or not, it is ruining our lives. One word at a time our minds are being destroyed by everything that isn't being said.

We are nervous. Worried that we aren't seeing the true meaning of something, worried that we should be looking further into what our friends say to us to find those words that they can't say.

We don't get a reply for a few hours and assume we are a bother, a pain, annoying. Isn't it more likely that the person is eating, doing work, out? It's jumping to conclusions that don't exist. Believing in the unrealistic situations which we picture in our imaginative minds.

We are human. We aren't well planned novels. No one has created us with a further meaning that what is on the surface. Yes, we are complicated but we are not a combination of messages and hidden meanings.

To listen to the wise words of Ted Mosby 'maybe... maybe a locket's just a locket, and... a chair's just a chair. Maybe we don't have to give meaning to every little thing.'

Perhaps sometimes it is logical to really think about things, to find that other meaning that isn't obvious but other times it just ruins things. You find yourself making up stuff which never happened, thinking people mean things that they have never even said.

Chances are if you are forever finding these other messages which aren't obvious it's just your mind analysing a situation to exhaustion. It doesn't make you a bad person and it doesn't make you broken or damaged.

It simply means that life might be a bit harder for you but that's ok, hopefully it will all be useful one day.

--- Aimee ---