Because change happens in layers, we tend to notice only the big changes, the ones that bring us celebrations or sorrows.  Yet, while all of this is happening, the very world around us is changing and the very body and psyches we inhabit are changing, too.   Time is moving forward in its tireless quietness, changing the very climate we live in, politics we engage in, and body parts we live through.  Our very perspectives change with each passing day, with maturing mindsets and the effects of experience. We can never live through something twice, as the very context in which an event can happen has changed.  My second daughter going off to college this next Fall, for example, is a very familiar event, yet, I am so different going through it, as well as my family being different since our first daughter left. We are wiser, more experienced, and yet, it will be completely new with the emptying of our nest.

One of the traditions I really enjoy this time of year are holiday cards, particularly the ones with the family photos.  It seems like such a great way to sum up the year, capturing in a snapshot what has changed and what has stayed the same.  New family members are added, with births and weddings, and some people are lost, with divorces and deaths. Kids are taller, older people shorter, and the hairstyles and fashions ever evolve.  These recorded images encapsulate for me the bittersweetness of the New Year, the saying goodbye to the old and the ringing in of the new. It may be happening slowly across the years or very suddenly, but everything is changing.

Even our change changes over time.  This January will be the 25th anniversary of my sister’s death. There are days that it feels like it just happened, despite a quarter of a century.  I can remember her face, the sound of her voice, the familiar feeling of sisterly rivalry or supportive praise. Yet, in just a year or so, she will have been gone longer than she was with me.  I wonder what her life would have been like, what she would have thought of my girls, my home, my friends and wonder if we still would have had the same squabbles we did, all those years ago. Yet, my attitudes have softened and my pain has shifted.  Our differences seem trivial and even my own stories of her have been shaped by the years of retelling. She is still 33, still and forever more. The truth is, I am now the older one.

I have heard it said that “Father Time always wins.”  I’d like to think that I have a less adversarial relationship  with the man. Because time also heals, renews, and gives us something to work toward and look forward to.  But most of all for me, it brings perspective and gratitude. With every day that passes, I may have more gray hair, but I also have more appreciation for the meaningful things in life that turned them gray!

When you look at the picture to the left, what do you see?  Is it a duck or a rabbit? Can you see both?  This illusion was  created by Joseph Jastrow, an American psychologist who was studying perception.  Would you be surprised to know that he found more people see a duck when tested in October, but a rabbit when tested close to Easter?

This type of experiment is one of many that researchers use to study how people form opinions and make judgments.  As scientists have learned more about complex mental functioning, it has helped us understand how our brains gather and then interpret information. According to Lisa Feldman Barrett, a researcher at Northwestern University, the brain is an “inference generating organ.” It is constantly filling in information to make sense out of ambiguous sensory input.  We are exposed to simply too much sensory information for the brain to process, so it uses predictions as a way of organizing information. In other words, if it is Easter, you are primed to see a rabbit, and so that it was what you will see.

In life, when interpreting ambiguous information, most of us are primed to see things in a way that is consistent with what we know or habitually think. This is known as “cognitive dissonance,” first posited by Leon Festinger. He observed that people will “cognize and interpret information to fit what they already believe.”  And further studies show the power of this can be very strong. That even when faced with contradicting information, we will hold on to a perception that is comfortably consistent with what we already believe, even if it means slightly distorting the new information or altering our memories.  And we do so without even realizing it! As Barrett writes,  if “the sensory information that comes in does not meet your prediction, you either change your prediction-or you change the the sensory information you receive.” Beliefs act like a lens, focusing our perceptions and our memories toward what we already believe.

So what does this have to do with getting along with my Uncle Fred this holiday, you may be asking?  I hope it will give you some understanding of how you can watch the same football game and one of you will be convinced that the NY Giants receiver was robbed of a touchdown by what should have been a penalty, and the other will be sure that the Dallas defender did a great job in coverage.  Or have greater tolerance for when you hear the latest news regarding the Mueller investigation, climate change research, or Supreme Court decisions and have completely different interpretations as another family member. It is not “just about the facts, ma’am.” It has to do with the way our brains are perceiving these facts.

So save yourself some frustration and energy this holiday.  Don’t waste your time and spirit trying to show Uncle Fred the slow motion rerun of the football play.  Don’t think that if you can just present the right argument or if Grandma could just be shown the “facts,” that she will see the light. And forget trying to convince your brother how Mom took his side in every argument.  The best way to get along in the short term is to agree to disagree. Because the truth is, as author Tom Vanderbilt explains, we all see the duck or the rabbit we knew was there.