Dandelion wisdom.

When I was young, my sister and I would spend hours in the summer sun, making daisy chains and holding dandelions up to our chins.

The proverbial wisdom was that if the gold of the dandelion was reflected on the underside of your jaw and the skin there glowed, you liked butter.

Even at ages eight and five, my sister and I loved finding things out about ourselves and holding those discoveries, (even something as simple as the dandelion butter test), up for evaluation.

For me butter was fine, but I didn't like it that much. (As opposed to my sister, who was an absolute fiend about butter, mayonnaise and any other gooey condiment she could get her hands on!) So did this test stand up to analysis? Well, no. Not in my mind at least.

If my sister was such a fan of butter, why didn't the gold reflected under her chin glow brighter than it did under mine?

As a child that was bound and determined to get to the bottom of things, I wanted to understand why. And after several more experiments and some research on the matter, I came to the conclusion that the dandelion experiment was a rubbish one.

Since then, having done countless tests and questionnaires ranging from Cleo magazine's 'What type of boyfriend is best for you,' to the Havard Predictive Index test I, like countless others before me, have realised that the quality of information gleaned from any test is only as good as the test itself. And as a writer and a woman, I began to apply that reasoning to any information I encountered, including that contained in other's responses to me.

If my boyfriend was angry at me for not doing what he wanted, was I deserving of the bitch label he so readily placed upon me? Over the course of time, and having made many mistakes, I came to the conclusion that the quality of information coming out of a person's mouth was only as good as they were.

I've learnt to ask; is this person kind? Are they well respected? Well educated? Do I care about them and what they think and say? That thought process allows me to weigh what's coming out of someone's mouth in light of how much stock I'm willing to place in them as a human being and hence, their opinion.

We live on an incredibly 'meta' planet. A world where unseen critics in unknown basements can spout opinions on everything from women's right to abortion, to how their favourite influencer looks in their latest purchase. And who knows, with what expertise they form those opinions? Yet we all all subjected to them.

The wonder and the pure joy of being a writer is having the ability to deep dive into the world of expression and opinion, and to reflect it. If I do it right, perhaps, just perhaps people will see themselves and begin to look at themselves and the world we live in in a new light. Illuminated and informed, conscious of the effects others opinions can have on their fellow human beings and on society as a whole. Conscious of how we feel about that ourselves...

Join me as I do just that.