Look Again

Iris Murdoch argued that morality is not only about choices at the moment of action. It is also about the long, quiet work of seeing. Her example is a mother who thinks her son’s wife is coarse and childish. The mother is polite, and nothing is said.

Then she reconsiders. She looks again, and decides that her first view was narrow and proud. The wife may be spontaneous and warm. The mother has changed nothing outward, yet something moral has happened, in how she sees.

Murdoch’s point is that we are always shaping the world we will later act in. A habit of fair, patient looking changes what choices appear. It can be practiced, like any skill.

The neighbor’s son

Corin thinks his neighbor’s teenage son is lazy and rude, because he never greets anyone and slouches at the bus stop. Corin says nothing, but he avoids the boy.

One day he sees the boy carrying shopping for an older woman, with great care and no fuss. Corin decides to look again, and over the next weeks notices that the boy is shy and works evenings. He starts saying good morning, and the boy answers.

Try this today Pick someone you judge harshly and write three fair things you could say about them.