We’ve all wondered “How could I have been so stupid?” We’ve all said to ourselves “What was I thinking?”
Know why?
Because in those moments that led up to these questions we weren’t thinking… well, I should say we think we were thinking, but we weren’t.
Aiming our minds on our reason and intelligence before springing into action assures that we engage our reason and intelligence. Otherwise, we’re acting on emotions, feelings, immediate physical sensations, or hormonal responses.
Those things aren’t inherently “bad”, but they combine with ego to appear wise, and when that’s all we’re listening to, we can’t make holistic, wise decisions.
Know why?
Because in those moments that led up to these questions we weren’t thinking… well, I should say we think we were thinking, but we weren’t.
Aiming our minds on our reason and intelligence before springing into action assures that we engage our reason and intelligence. Otherwise, we’re acting on emotions, feelings, immediate physical sensations, or hormonal responses.
Those things aren’t inherently “bad”, but they combine with ego to appear wise, and when that’s all we’re listening to, we can’t make holistic, wise decisions.
For to be wise is only one thing - to fix our attention on our intelligence, which guides all things everywhere.”
(Heraclitus, quoted in Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, 9.1)
Emotions, hormones, and sensations inform our decisions and actions, but we cannot allow them to be the chief maker of decisions.
It’d be like asking a child to make the daily choices for the family’s dinner. There would be a lot of spaghetti, or cake, or cheese-covered things, and while those things are great on occasion, eating like that every day is not WISE eating.
Our work is to focus our minds on our inborn Wisdom and act from there. We can check the success of our work by the absence of questions like “What was I thinking?”
(See y’all tomorrow)
It’d be like asking a child to make the daily choices for the family’s dinner. There would be a lot of spaghetti, or cake, or cheese-covered things, and while those things are great on occasion, eating like that every day is not WISE eating.
Our work is to focus our minds on our inborn Wisdom and act from there. We can check the success of our work by the absence of questions like “What was I thinking?”
(See y’all tomorrow)
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