La Voz de Galicia – May 23, 2025 →
These days, I’ve found myself thinking about how comfortable I’ve always felt with ambiguity. With the certainty that there is no single way to understand the world, but as many ways as there are people. The Galician Language Academy defines the word ambiguous as “something that can be interpreted in different ways, that has two or more meanings.” And I believe that growing up in music, interpreting instrumental compositions written by others, helped me appreciate the many “different ways” we have of understanding the things around us. Because the musical experience itself is an ambiguous and abstract one (like all the arts), and practice leads us to become comfortable with the idea that everything is open to multiple interpretations of the same concept, the same work.
And even though music and the arts are more accessible than ever through our phones and computers, tolerating ambiguity remains a difficult task—so difficult that, whenever we can, we discard nuance and cling to a single, already-biased interpretation that doesn’t require our own interpretation or opinion. And from that passivity—from accepting someone else’s opinion as our own, from that lack of appreciation for nuance—comes the polarization that is leading the world down an increasingly unsustainable path.
PBut the “absolute truths” saturating the headlines of today’s politicians are growing more dangerous and more contagious. And drawing our own conclusions is becoming harder and harder, because everything moves so fast that no one takes the time to explain the nuances to us anymore. And without nuance, we don’t learn. Without nuance, we fade away. Without nuance, we are nothing more than a headline that, by the day after tomorrow, no longer exists…
