Hi, and welcome to March, where Bossy is posting every single weekday this month. Note: that does not mean every single day. It means every single day minus those fun days.
Anyway. Bossy would like to begin by trying to solve the mystery of a term she has never understood. And that term is as follows:
Suspension of disbelief.
Attributed to the 19th Century poet and philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge, suspension of disbelief is the theory that if there’s enough truth sprinkled in a tale, the audience will overlook the other more implausible things surrounding the narrative.
But here’s the problem. Bossy always thought when a person is believing something implausible, that person is suspending their belief.
Because when you buy a pack of deception, aren’t you suspending what you believe, and not what you don’t believe?
If you missed what Bossy wrote so far in March, click here for drawings of her current life.
Charlie says
March 4, 2013 at 9:17 amWhen suspending my belief, I use a two-harness system with a self-retracting lanyard so that my belief doesn’t spill all over my fanaticism, forming “belaticism” (which, as you know, is highly volatile when in contact with oxygen and/or bourbon).
zidia says
March 4, 2013 at 10:32 amI am suspending my disbelief to an optimism of having a lot more Bossy this month!
KathyB says
March 4, 2013 at 1:05 pmSometimes a movie will lose me, oh so briefly, so that my disbelief awakens from its suspended state.Not happy when that occurs.
As for Coleridge, might have been the opium talking 🙂 Hurray, Bossy is posting, lots!
Lovelyn says
March 4, 2013 at 1:35 pmI’ve never quite understood this term either.
bossysMom says
March 4, 2013 at 3:52 pmNot unlike all of these expressions.
Crystal Spraggins says
March 4, 2013 at 11:45 pmOkay, here goes. When you’re presented with something implausible in a movie for example, you may not believe it. In other words, you experience disbelief. However, for the sake of continuing to be engaged in the drama, you will suspend that DISBELIEF. Ergo, suspension of disbelief! I feel smart now.
Jenn @ Juggling Life says
March 5, 2013 at 10:12 pmI never didn’t understand the phrase until Bossy explained her understanding of the phrase and I was mildly confused for a moment and then I read Crystal Spraggins explanation and I thought, “Yes!”