Laws of Grammer

What if the laws of grammar are distinct from the laws of nature?

Imagine a number—perhaps the number “5”. Here’s a question for you: Does “5” occur by itself in nature? Have you ever seen “5”? Surely, you’ve seen “5” of something, but never “5” by itself.

Our numbering structure represents an abstraction—it does not map to anything in nature directly. You can always say something like “I have 5 fingers and 5 toes, and the working week has 5 days in it”. But notice the number “5” is always associated with something else. The number “5” never occurs outside our own thinking.

Because we use language so much and rely on it so heavily, it’s very easy to think “5” is real.

If you decide to step off the top of a building, gravity WILL send you to the ground. If you turn on a light, it WILL take a whole second for someone 186,000 miles away to see it. Nature’s laws hold true and are inviolable.

At the same time, there are a number of other ideas that you may think of as law, but they’re not set in stone. They’re ultimately more akin to tendencies we observe (rather than being a law that must be obeyed).

Believing in ideas like “that’s the way it has always been, so that’s the way it’s gonna be” and “I’ll never be able to do that” are just mental constructs—rather than edicts set by nature that must be followed. You created them as figments of your imagination and you may reduce their importance in your life, or even dismiss them completely if they don’t serve you or take you in the direction you wish to go.

Ideas such as “I can do anything I put my mind to” and “there’s always a way if I’m committed” are also figments of your imagination. You created them in the first place, and you are free to bolster them and make them play a more important role in your life if you find they do serve you.