The Buzz of Being Right vs. the Work of Being Curious

The Work From Certainty to Curiosity: A Guide to Spicy Living in the RE-Era

I used to think people who changed their minds couldn’t be trusted. Weak. Flimsy. Like they were just saying whatever was convenient instead of standing for something real. Or, acting the puppet believing someone nefarious was pulling their strings.

But when I changed my own mind? Oh, that was different. That was brave. That was me evolving. That was growth with a capital G. At least that’s what I told myself.

Looking back, it’s almost funny. I applauded my own transformation like it deserved a medal, while quietly judging other people for theirs. If they shifted, I thought they were flaky. If I shifted, I was enlightened. That’s hypocrisy, plain and simple. Tightness in my chest even writing this.

And the wild part? None of that was running through my head in the moment. It was all under the surface, shaping my reactions without me realizing it. Sneaky little currents. I only spotted them later, when I slowed down long enough to notice.

That’s when I started thinking about what it means to live in a RE-Era. To REbuild what was broken. To REconsider the stories we’ve been told. To REcreate a life that actually fits. Transformation isn’t weakness. It’s the only way we grow.

We all wear glasses. Not the kind you pick up at your local drugstore, but invisible lenses that tint how we see the world. Most of the time we forget they’re even on. We assume our view is The View.

And here’s the trap. When my perspective feels like Truth with a capital T, that means someone else’s perspective must be a lie. However, if you can, really, once you stand in their shoes, their version of reality makes just as much sense to them as mine does to me. Perspective is powerful, but it is not the same as Truth. The confusion between the two is where judgment grows, where moral superiority sneaks in, where curiosity gets shut down.

And here’s where it gets tricky. The high we get from our perspective feels like certainty, but really it’s just the buzz of being right. It’s intoxicating, and it makes us believe our view is the only truth worth defending.

The Threat Glasses make everything feel dangerous. A quiet text becomes bad news. A leaf rustling outside is a burglar. The gift is you stay prepared. I had extra batteries and water when hurricanes came. The shadow is you lose years of peace bracing for disasters that never come. (to me-this seems the roots of anxiety)

The Scarcity Glasses whisper not enough into everything. Not enough love, time, money, approval. They’ll convince you to split a protein bar into three meals and still feel guilty about eating it. The gift is resourcefulness. The shadow is emptiness, even when your table is full. (for me-this was a lifetime of feeling never good enough)

The Betrayal Glasses replay every wound in high definition. A missed call turns into a conspiracy. A forgotten birthday feels like proof you’ll always be left behind. The gift is strong boundaries. The shadow is a lonely fortress where trust rarely enters. (in my life this involved shame and isolation)

The Beauty Glasses light up the world with silver linings. Sunsets sparkle, dumpster fires look like performance art. The gift is joy. The shadow is denial, where you ignore real pain until it cracks the floor under you. (For me, the happy endings girl, make everything SEEM ok from the looks of things)

The Connection Glasses show invisible threads between people. You notice the ache in someone else’s eyes, or share a laugh with a stranger in the checkout line. The gift is belonging. The shadow is smoothing things over when truth needs to be spoken.

We call them glasses, but they’re really something deeper. Threat, Scarcity, Betrayal, Beauty, Connection. That’s the whole damn human software suite. These aren’t random moods. They’re the fundamental, almost primal modes of operation we all run on.

And here’s the thing. Nailing down these five gives us a framework that’s broad enough to contain multitudes but specific enough to actually be useful.

It’s a healing map. I can trace my own midlife RE-Era right through these lenses. The years I spent glued inside Betrayal Glasses, convinced everyone was out to hurt me. The seasons of Scarcity, where nothing was ever enough. The times Beauty covered me like denial wallpaper. If you’ve been stuck in one lens so long it feels fused to your face, that’s not weakness. It just means it’s time to gently, finally, try on another pair.

It’s also a social detox. Sometimes it feels like whole tribes are glued to just one lens, yelling at each other as if seeking to understand were a betrayal to the cause. I’m not asking you to agree with the other side. Agreement can be shallow. What I’m asking is something harder and more generous: understanding. Because understanding is what keeps us human.

And honestly? It’s Spicy Living incarnate. Spicy isn’t about hot sauce on your tacos. It’s about having the courage to see and feel the whole spectrum; the contradiction, the beauty, the betrayal, the laughter and the ache. It’s about swapping lenses instead of clinging to the bland, beige safety of one rigid viewpoint.

Wisdom isn’t about picking the right glasses. It’s about doing the full 360. Rotating. Trying on different lenses. Seeing the gifts and shadows of each.

And here’s the part that really stings. The glasses themselves aren’t the addiction. The real high is the buzz we get from wearing them. It feels good to be right. Addicting, even. That rush when you sort people into good guys and bad guys and know for sure you’re on the right side. Moral Superiority... so much easier than curiosity & understanding. Faster than empathy. Way less work than trying on somebody else’s lens.

But it’s counterfeit. It warms you while it robs you. I thought I was being discerning, but I was just getting high on moral superiority.

Nobody likes that phrase. It sounds ugly. But if you’ve ever rolled your eyes at someone else’s shift while celebrating your own, you know the taste of it. That smug glow sneaks in and hooks us before we realize what’s happening.

That high is why we stop listening. That high is why we double down. That high is why we lose sight of each other’s humanity.

So here’s the choice. Do I want the quick buzz of being right, or the harder work of being curious?

Spicy Living isn’t about pretending we all agree. It’s about laughing anyway. It’s about staying human in the middle of disagreement. It’s about curiosity when certainty feels safer.

The RE-Era isn’t a 180 flip. It’s a full 360. You keep turning. You keep examining. You keep growing. You see more, you soften more, and you hold the people across from you as human, even when you don’t see eye to eye.

That’s the work. That’s the path. That’s the only way back to each other. Drop SPICY in the comments if you are ready to join the REera REvolution, the uprising of curiosity over certainty and connection over division!