Tuesday musings on binary choices, cultural conditioning, and the poverty of either/or thinking.
Robert Redford passed away the other morning at 89, peacefully at his Sundance home surrounded by family. And I gotta say, the news hit me harder than I expected, not just because of the films, but because of what his passing represents. The end of an era when movie stars could embody complexity without apology.
It got me thinking about a question everyone seemed to ask when I was growing up, “Who do you prefer—Robert Redford or Paul Newman?”
As if you had to choose. As if appreciating Redford’s quiet intensity in All the President’s Men somehow negated Newman’s charisma in Butch Cassidy. As if your answer said something essential about who you were, or what team you belonged to.
I grew up during the height of this cultural binary obsession. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting, The Way We Were, All the President’s Men. Redford was everywhere, and everywhere you had to declare allegiance. Then it was Starsky or Hutch. Later, Cagney or Lacey, the ambitious detective or the working mom, as if women in law enforcement could only come in two flavours. Moonlighting’s uptight Maddie or charming David. Two archetypes. Pick your side. Defend your choice.
I believe we were being programmed to see the world in opposites, and to believe that complexity was somehow cheating.
The persistence of binary thinking
And really, not much has changed. We’re still being asked to choose sides in ways that impoverish our thinking and limit our possibilities.
Career-wise, we’re told we can be one thing. Artist or businessperson. Spiritual or practical. Creative or analytical. As if the soul recognizes these artificial boundaries. As if mastery in one area somehow disqualifies you from talent in another.
Politically, we’re sorted into camps as if nuanced positions don’t exist, as if you can’t hold conservative views on some issues and progressive ones on others, as if political identity must be totalizing rather than thoughtful.
Even spiritually, we’re pressured to pick a lane. You’re either religious or secular, mystical or rational, Eastern or Western in your approach. God forbid you find wisdom across traditions or create your own synthesis. (Yes, I know I said ‘God’; how did that make you feel?)
The soul’s natural complexity
What I’ve learned from decades of working with people in transition is the soul doesn’t do binary. It doesn’t think in either/or. It thinks in yes/and, in both/neither, in the spaces between categories that our minds insist don’t exist.
The most interesting people I know refuse these artificial divisions. They’re artists who understand business, mystics who appreciate science, conservatives who care about the environment, and progressives who value tradition. They’ve learned to hold paradox without needing to resolve it immediately into something simpler.
This isn’t wishy-washy thinking. It’s sophisticated thinking. It’s the recognition that truth is usually found not in the extremes, but in the willingness to hold multiple perspectives simultaneously.
The invitation goes beyond choosing
So, what if, instead of asking “Robert Redford or Paul Newman?” we had asked “What does each of them teach us about different ways of being in the world?”
What if, instead of forcing ourselves into predetermined categories, we got curious about what wants to come through when we stop limiting our options to Column A or Column B?
Your soul contains multitudes. It doesn’t fit neatly into the boxes our culture insists on creating. It can hold contradictions, appreciate complexity, and find truth in unexpected places.
The binary, polarity thinking that shaped our formative years doesn’t have to shape our becoming years. You get to be more than one thing. You get to evolve beyond the categories that once defined you.
Robert Redford was an actor, director, environmentalist, businessman, activist, and artist. He never seemed to feel the need to pick just one identity and stick with it. Maybe that’s part of his lasting appeal. At least for me. He embodied the possibility of containing multitudes.
