Neil Salsich's Assignment ~ What The Bleep Do We Know!?
How does the story of Amanda illustrate M.Scott Peck's ideas about "maps"?
Amanda, the main character of the story in What The Bleep Do We Know!?, is a prime example of M. Scott Peck's ideas of "maps". Peck, in his book The Road Less Traveled, explains his theory that each person's grasp of reality is like map, and that we use those maps to navigate through life. He explains further that after we experience certain life-changing events or reach a certain age and understanding of the world, we must revise our maps. However, revising our maps can be a painful and tedious process, thus causing some people to leave their maps unchanged. They then apply their outdated and unreliable map to a new people and places, causing their view of reality to be false and distorted. This is called transference, when someone inappropriately applies their outdated map to a new life experience.
Amanda, hurt and emotional scarred from her marriage experience, applies her unrevised map to her new life. We know from the flashbacks of the film that soon after Amanda's marriage, she catches her husband with another woman. She is extremely hurt by this and by not revising her map, she lets it affect her whole life. Specifically, while photographing a wedding (in the same church she was married in), when she takes pictures of the bride and groom, she sees herself nd her husband in the picture. Throughout the reception, she notices the groom hitting on a bridesmaid, and after seeing the silhouette of a separate couple having sex, she assumes it is the groom with the bridesmaid and pubicly accuses the groom of being unfaithful, only to make a fool of herself. She then copes with her embarrassment and insecurity by drinking, so much that she wakes up in the morning not being able to remember most of the night. All of this resulted because Amanda applied her old map of insecurity and no trust in people to her new experience.
The next morning at her apartment, she is disgusted with her behavior and her physical beauty, screaming at herself in the mirror of the bathroom. It is only after a remembrance of the words "If negative thoughts can do that to water, imagine what they can do to us", that she experiences a metanoia and revises her map. She is now equipped with a whole new view on the world that will allow her to foster new relationships and live life to the fullest.