I am a series of contradictions. The cause is this complicated world of ours. I can often see a benefit or two coming from both sides of an argument. Not all the time, but sometimes. So I go back and forth in my opinions. Not willy-nilly. But maybe teeter-totter. See what I mean?
All that aside, I’m not a contronym.
A “contronym” is a word that’s its own opposite. As an example. If we “seed” our lawns, we add the seeds. But if we “seed” a tomato, we take the seeds out. So there it is. Seed is a contronym.
There are all sorts of words that work in this way, the ones that have two meanings, both of which are contradictory to each other.
Another example. “Put out.”
First, to extinguish. She put out the fire in the wastebasket.
Or to generate. So far, I have put out two books.
How about “left?”
To depart. Elvis has left the building.
Or to remain. There are still a lot of hot dogs left on the grill.
One of my favorites? “Dust.”
To sprinkle with fine particles. I always dust my waffles with powdered sugar.
Or to remove fine particles. I am going to dust off the shelf.
There are more and more. Like buckle, screen, execute and clip, to name a few.
But it just goes to show us a thing or two about life.
There are two sides to a coin.
And sometimes, what appears to be an opposing thing, might be the same after all.
That penny we flip. Tails on one side and heads on the other. Yet, when we see the bigger picture, they are both a part of the same coin.
Whenever we hear a story or approach an idea, perhaps we should try to stand back and try to have a look at the whole thing. We could find more than we ever initially imagined. There might be two perfectly good meanings to one single thing.
We should consider it all.
Otherwise, we might be in a real fix.
Oh, but let’s think about a “fix.”
One is to repair.
And the other? To castrate.
Like I said. We should always consider the whole big thing.
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“I have never agreed with my other self wholly. The truth of the matter seems to lie between us.”
― Khalil Gibran
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Doubt is not the opposite of faith; it is one element of faith.
— Paul Tillich
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The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth.
— Niels Bohr
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The two meanings that mean two things.
