The Truth Quest: Your Truth or Mine?

I had a fun conversation with my wife the other day on our way out to the lake. She said “I am worried about you. A while back you made a statement in your blog about your truth, my truth and universal truth. I don’t know what that means. Real truth is the same for everyone.” Her statement made me pause and rethink what I was trying to say. 

The Quest

I feel that the quest for truth is a fundamental foundation to good leadership and a peaceful conscience. I think it is important for us to recognize that, as unique individuals, what we perceive can be different. The fact that we may not agree on what is true, does not change what is true. We may have truthfully experienced or seen something differently, but our experience or our perception of what we saw does not change what actually is.  

Perception Changes

So that brings us back to how do we know what is true? Often our idea of what is true is based on what we know at the time – the evidence. Until some can show or prove that what we think to be true at the time is not actually true, it is true for us. Once someone shows us a different way, our old “truth” just becomes our perception of what was true. The truth did not change, just our perception did. That is why we have to understand that finding what is true is a quest. Because we are capable of always learning (and making mistakes), we are capable of discovering new truths everyday. 

Truth Does Not

A Nazarene named Jesus once said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free”  John 8: 31-32. To me, the implication is that as long as we remain students (disciples) and in this case learn from the word of God, we will be shown the unchanging truths of this life and the afterlife. And to know what is really true is freeing, empowering and life giving.