Kay:

Hey there Questers, it is episode 274 which means it is Thursday, January 21st and we are stoked to have a Charlotte Bronte quote for you today. She says, “Conventionality is not morality.”

Shi:

Four words that really bring a lot of opportunity for reflection. At first pass it’s, “okay, what’s always done doesn’t mean it’s always right.” But as you start to unpack that conventionality becomes conventional because everyone’s doing it, and everyone believes in it and all of the momentum and the history things are dictating that this is right and good. Then you think about this idea of morality like that compass for society, the values, and what is good and labeled as good and then you see that in the middle here she’s saying conventionality is not morality. It’s not reflective of what that true good is that we would want to define with morality and yet it’s what most people believe.

Kay:

Now let’s put this in a practical example for you guys. These are completely the most obvious examples out there. Remember slavery? People actually thought that was good. In fact, a whole half of the country fought for that.

Shi:

Yeah.

Kay:

Then, a good portion of us fought against it but a good portion fought for it and it was such a norm. So that’s an example of what has been done – which wasn’t the moral thing to be done – and even then we saw the rise of child labor happening at the beginning of the 20th century and then that being abolished. But it really hasn’t even been that long since kids weren’t allowed to work for absolute pennies on the dollar and that was just as it has always done. Of course, we grow up our kids, they work on the farm, they learn the farm, they take the farm. When the industrial revolution came around, it was kids going to factories and kids learning to work in the factories. Now it’s not the family legacy, it’s the kids working for the corporation, but it was how it had always been done and so the morality of the decision wasn’t called into question for a really long time.

Shi:

This really invites you to bring that curiosity to what is identified as “conventional” because looking at the obvious ones from history, it’s easy to be removed from that and say, “well, of course, slavery is wrong and now humanity has come through that.” But you look at the way that human history demonstrates that we’re on this progressive path of becoming more aware and conscious of how we want to treat each other and what morality really means. So, things like homosexuality and things like multi-gendered identifications and different things and ways of being that even 10 years ago, 20 years ago were very unconventional and definitely not moral to most people. This is still an active process, this questioning of conventionality, and that inviting of curiosity into identifying what morality really is and how we can bring more awareness and attention to it.

Kay:

Now, let’s take this from a societal level and just bring it into the home really quick because we’ve noticed that people sometimes have a tendency to take what’s conventional for what might be even more comfortable for them if they were to just take a look. Now, when Danny and I moved into our new house, we’re in a home we’ve been in now for about five months, it’s been wonderful. There is this half door that always would slam and the lady who sold us the house would say, “Man, it just always slams, the door just slams.” Within 24 hours, we had moved in, we had put a hook on the door, so you could just hook it open, and voila the door never slams. You don’t have to try and open it with a fire extinguisher, and nobody suffers because of the slamming door. So, it was this little thing, this conventionality, that wasn’t necessarily for the good of the owner.

Shi:

Surely you can think of things like that in your own life. Chad and I had blankets covering our kids’ windows until probably the twins were seven and then we got blackout curtains for $25 at Walmart, took two seconds to hang up. We’re like, “Oh.” Conventionality, we’ve just been ghetto hanging blankets in our windows. At his mom’s house for Christmas, she had alarms start going off at 12 o’clock and everyone looks around like, what is that? She goes, “Oh, that’s just the temperature thing over there. I can’t get it to turn off and so it just goes off every day for two minutes. Don’t worry. It turns off.” By the way, the temperature thing doesn’t even really work for the outside, but it still works for the inside. I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself thinking she’s just gotten used to it. It’s just this conventional thing that is what it always is but perhaps just removing it or questioning and inviting some curiosity into the standard of that conventionality would maybe bring a different result that can make her a little happier a little quicker.

Kay:

So, from society to unfinished home projects, be reflective of this as we revisit Charlotte Bronte’s quote that, “Conventionality is not morality.”

Shi:

Alright, and for your #ThoughtfulThursday Quest today, we want you to evaluate where you may be holding onto something as right or good, that morality piece, that might just be conventional instead. Are you holding yourself back by holding on? That’s your thought for the day.

Kay:

Are you ready?

Kay & Shi:

Let’s quest!