Just Plain Bill
Six blind men and an elephant
This old fable came to
mind as Brett, a friend of mine, was viewing Oakland’s beautiful Lake Merritt
from the deck of our 17th floor apartment. While he had walked, run,
and cycled the 3+ miles around the lake probably over a hundred times, he felt
he was “seeing” the lake for the first time from this overhead perspective.
To refresh one’s
memory of the fable, six blind men were arguing about what an elephant looked
like to them. One only touched the tail, another the ear, still another the
tusks, and so on until each of the six were correctly describing what the
elephant “looked like” or really felt like – and yet collectively, they were incorrect.
As I age, and
hopefully grow in wisdom, I continuously remind myself to stop and look at the “big
picture”, the so-called view from 10,000 feet (or the 17th floor), when
addressing a problem or looking for a different way to accomplish something.
Both Brett’s observation and the six blind men and an elephant fable have
served to remind me to do just that.
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