"Your environment, no matter how good or no matter how bad, eventually becomes normal to you": acclimation vs normalization
I ran into this video the other day on I Luv Juice, caught by the environment quote captured in the title above.
It reminded me that once upon a time I was reflecting on acclimation, a thought that I find worth considering often:
"I find it important to remember that humans acclimate to everything.
This means that things we think are bad/painful/ridiculous become ok after enough exposure and time. It also means that the things we think are good/exciting/worthwhile become ok after enough exposure and time."
It's important to note that I'm talking about acclimation in that post, which is closely related but is not the same as normalization. Both are about perception, but acclimation is concerned with affinity while normalization is a bit more complex, concerned with one's perception of how the world should function.
When I talk about acclimation, I talk about how one's affinity for a new emotional state eventually shifts away from like/dislike with exposure; this is one's affinity for a new job, new city, recent breakup, or disliked food. In the post I help qualify with the statement "this is not to say that things stay that way; I'm talking about a relatively short timeline."
Perhaps author Bernard Benson captures part of this with the following thought:
"All we really want is otherness, tossing from side to side, greeting each toss with shouts of welcome, and contempt for the previous toss."
As you see in the video above, normalization is a different beast, and a bit more complicated. Normalization is concerned with one's expectations from their environment and the world, captured best with the intension (linguistically speaking - not 'intention') of the word 'should.' That is to say that normalization is the state of subconsciously assessing your environment as operating as it 'should.'
Normalization is entirely environmental, and helps explain why you have the beliefs, values, and worldview you do. It helps explain how others have developed those things as well. It helps explain why when those things clash between you and others, only by exposing each other to new environmental norms (either directly or cognitively) can your differences be resolved. I started exploring this once with the idea that the only cure is exposure.
On a more entrepreneurially inspiring note, it helps to see how Brian in the video above uses this understanding to change the lives of students in the disadvantaged environment of New Orleans' 9th Ward.
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