Have you
ever wondered what would things be like if this or that had happened
differently? Or if you had made a
different decision in the past, would you be in a better position today or
would you be in a worse position? I
think all of us at one time or another have had those thoughts: If ONLY we had done things differently!
There’s
nothing wrong with daydreaming and wondering how the outcome would have
changed. However, a more useful exercise
would be to examine decisions made along with their outcomes BEFORE making new
decisions or taking new actions. You’ve
probably heard it said: If you continue
to do things the same way, you’re going to get the same results.
It seems
that the desire to go back in our lives and “fix” the things we did wrong has
been the topic of many a Hollywood movie.
Quiet often the theme is that it can be done and the aftermath would be
that all in our life would now be “rosy” and “perfect”: just the way it should
have been from the beginning. However,
the reality is that: first, we CAN’T go back and do things over. There’s no Delorian or Marty McFly who is
going to zip into the past and make a few adjustments and then zip back to the
future and live the “charmed” life. Second,
if it WERE possible most movies leave out ALL the intrinsic details of the
complexities that would be involved in altering even one detail of the
past. This has been called by some the
Butterfly Effect! What is it and how
does it relate to our topic of changing something in the past?
Simply
put, the butterfly effect is defined (with reference to the chaos theory) as
the phenomenon whereby a minute localized change in a complex system can have
large effects elsewhere. This is not a
new notion. Fichte in The
Vacation of Man (1800) stated: “You
could not remove a single grain of sand from its place without thereby …
changing something throughout all parts of the immeasurable whole.”
This
might sound like an unrealistic assumption.
How can a slight change like that one result in a big one such as a change
the WHOLE? Here is an example (very
simple) that will help you understand the Butterfly Effect theory in real
life. A man was working in a company
where he was mistreated by his manager and after months of being disrespected
by his arrogant boss he decided to quit.
Before the man left the company he spoke about it to the other employees
and the result was that three other people decided to quit too.
When
those people found themselves unemployed they decided to start their own
business. After some time and a lot of
hard work their business became a very successful operation to the extent that
they started competing with the company they used to work for. Under the pressure of the fierce competition the
old company declared bankruptcy!
Didn’t
you just notice the Butterfly Effect in that example? The mistreatment of a SINGLE employee
resulted in the bankruptcy of the company years later. This is what the Butterfly Effect theory is
all about, a small unnoticeable change that can result in a very big one later
on.
But as I
mentioned earlier, the butterfly effect is also a common theme in fiction
(particularly in the movies). This theme
typically involves presenting multiple what-if scenarios when one story line
diverges into two different outcomes because of a change in a minor event.
I thought
one of the more interesting of these movie sources was The Butterfly Effect. A 2004 movie starring Ashton Kutcher, Amy
Smart, and Melora Walters about a young man who struggles to access sublimated
childhood memories. He finds a technique
that allows him to travel back into the past, to occupy his childhood body and
change history. However, he soon finds that
every change he makes has unexpected consequences: Mostly to his detriment.
In
summation I think we all realize that knowing the things we did at a certain
time period in the past means we would probably make the SAME decisions that we
made then. We also know that we CAN’T
return to the past and change anything from happening the way they did. However, IF ONLY we could! HOW would things turn out? We’ll never know.
QUOTE TO CONSIDER
THOUGHTFUL GEM
"When the job gets done successfully ---
don't worry about who gets the credit!"
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