Curiosity is the direct incontinence of the spirit.
Jeremy Taylor
*******************
Hello Stuart
*******************
Incontinence? One definition is "a lacking in moderation or self-control." It can also be described as "wantonness."
Albert Einstein once said that he wasn't so clever but that he was just very curious. Thank goodness for the wantonness of curiosity. Without it we wouldn't have half the modern world that we do. There is always something for scientists, artists, philosophers and cats to poke their noses into. And the experience is usually very private and personal, even though the world may benefit from what is discovered.
One of my favorite photographs is of a NASA geologist peering at a small piece of moon rock. Every time I look at that picture it awakens my own curiosity, not about the rock, but about the man himself.
I wonder if his knowledge of earth's geology can help him make any sense out of what he sees. I wonder if in his youth, when he knew he was going to be a scientist, and eventually decided on geology, if he ever thought that someday he would be looking at a piece of the moon, holding it in his hand. I winder if he thinks about that as he stares at that chunk of the universe.
1,000 years ago going to the moon was conceivable, because it was the stuff of imagination for philosophers, scientists and poets. 100 years ago it wasn't conceivable for we hadn't even lifted off the ground yet. (To some die hard revisionists it's still inconceivable.)
Curiosity is one of those things that doesn't go away. It demands answers. It may perplex thinkers for thousands of years, but eventually the digging, the poking of the nose, will pay off with answers, the human spirit will see to that.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never give up.
************************
Showing posts with label curiosity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label curiosity. Show all posts
Monday, June 18, 2012
Sunday, November 27, 2011
No Yawning
The best way to live is by not knowing what will happen to you by the end of the day.
Daniel Barthelme
*********************
Hello Jen
*********************
Someone recently remarked that my life is not boring. How can a man who lives alone, in an attic apartment, in a small and quiet town, with no family, no pets and hardly any visitors not live a boring life? How can that be, especially since he spent his working life in the entertainment business, as an actor, one of the most interesting, exciting and action filled professions there is and one which is never boring? Why isn't he bored to a perpetual yawn now?
I have known people in my days who were expert at planning out their lives so well that they knew where they would be at any minute during the day. They would keep to strict schedules, were dependably prompt and never deviated from the discipline of their lives. That's a noble way to live, I suppose, but it doesn't allow for much improvisation, adventure or whimsy. And when carried to an extreme it tends to invoke rules for buttoning shirts and tying shoes.
"I always do my laundry at 11 Saturday morning."
"Why not do it Friday night instead?"
"Oh no, Friday night is my time for doing the crossword puzzle."
It gets ridiculous. Some people will tell you that if they didn't carefully plan out the day little would ever get done, and I agree with that. Any serious actor knows time must be set aside for memorizing lines and developing the script. When rehearsal and performance times come the actor must be there and ready to work. But if it weren't for the freedom of expression and imagination, the unexpected moments of creativity, the bright light of inspiration that suddenly flicks on, the actors performance would be boring. The arts when properly done are never boring.
So why aren't I bored? Why isn't my life boring? Although I like a good healthy yawn now and then, I'm not an authority on boredom. My life in theatre taught me curiosity, imagination and, best of all, enthusiasm. It also taught me to respect the unexpected.
When the stranger wanders into your life, when the door you always go through is suddenly locked and when the steady rhythms of your day become syncopated smile, boredom has just fled out the window like an escaping racoon.
If you can embrace with enthusiasm the ever new, ever changing story of your life it can only get better.
Dana B - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
***********************
Daniel Barthelme
*********************
Hello Jen
*********************
Someone recently remarked that my life is not boring. How can a man who lives alone, in an attic apartment, in a small and quiet town, with no family, no pets and hardly any visitors not live a boring life? How can that be, especially since he spent his working life in the entertainment business, as an actor, one of the most interesting, exciting and action filled professions there is and one which is never boring? Why isn't he bored to a perpetual yawn now?
I have known people in my days who were expert at planning out their lives so well that they knew where they would be at any minute during the day. They would keep to strict schedules, were dependably prompt and never deviated from the discipline of their lives. That's a noble way to live, I suppose, but it doesn't allow for much improvisation, adventure or whimsy. And when carried to an extreme it tends to invoke rules for buttoning shirts and tying shoes.
"I always do my laundry at 11 Saturday morning."
"Why not do it Friday night instead?"
"Oh no, Friday night is my time for doing the crossword puzzle."
It gets ridiculous. Some people will tell you that if they didn't carefully plan out the day little would ever get done, and I agree with that. Any serious actor knows time must be set aside for memorizing lines and developing the script. When rehearsal and performance times come the actor must be there and ready to work. But if it weren't for the freedom of expression and imagination, the unexpected moments of creativity, the bright light of inspiration that suddenly flicks on, the actors performance would be boring. The arts when properly done are never boring.
So why aren't I bored? Why isn't my life boring? Although I like a good healthy yawn now and then, I'm not an authority on boredom. My life in theatre taught me curiosity, imagination and, best of all, enthusiasm. It also taught me to respect the unexpected.
When the stranger wanders into your life, when the door you always go through is suddenly locked and when the steady rhythms of your day become syncopated smile, boredom has just fled out the window like an escaping racoon.
If you can embrace with enthusiasm the ever new, ever changing story of your life it can only get better.
Dana B - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
***********************
Friday, December 24, 2010
Consider The Sax
The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.
Marcel Proust
*********************
The world is indeed a strange place.
Yesterday I went for a walk in order to purchase something I needed. The walk takes about 25 minutes. It is hard for me to walk even in the best weather but it was below freezing with a strong, bitter wind blowing almost constantly. About half way to my destination there is a pocket park which consists of a row of iron benches surrounding a stone structure. In the warm weather that structure is a circular pit with a fountain in the middle. It's a pleasant little place and in the summer the squirrels come and visit, looking for a handout, and the birds will perch on the edge and sometimes dip in to refresh themselves in the water. But now the fountain is covered over by a cloth which is tied down from the wind. It has the appearance of a ghostly object mysteriously sticking up from the empty pit around it.
I sat on one of the benches to rest and must have seemed to any passer as a spectral object myself, bundled up in my overcoat, sitting where no sane person would expect to be sitting in that weather.
I knew it was a fountain because I have sat there many a summer's day. But I wondered what someone would think of it who had never seen it uncovered and gently splashing with water. It resembled an unexplainable, mystical shrine of some pagan variety. One would have to imagine what it was and what it did.
Consider a saxophone. If you had never seen one before, never saw anyone playing it or knew what it was called, do you think you would identify it as a musical instrument. It's a twisty metal thing that comes to a point at one end, folds out into a well with a hole in it at the other end and in between are a bunch of holes, looking like an octopus's tentacle, with covers over them. Would your imagination tell you it was for making music or would it devise a different use, such as a planter for vines.
I had a friend who liked to visit me during my radio shift when I was a broadcaster. She would sit in front of the consol and just stare at the knobs, switches, buttons, meters and the strange inert but dangerous looking thing that stuck up into her face. She would ask me what this thing was for and what that thing did. She knew that the end result was a radio broadcast but that consol might just as well have been a wall in an ancient Egyptian tomb.
What about a foreign language? If you saw the characters of Hebrew or Arabic for the first time and didn't know it was a language would you imagine those funny looking squiggles and curves would render spoken sound, or letters, words, sentences, ideas?
I, like most people, have been fascinated with the strange objects of the world and, like my friend at the radio station, I want to know what this thing is, what it does and what it's for.
Once you know what a thing is and what it does you can start asking why. That's a delicious task for the imagination. What makes the water spout up, how does a saxophone work, why is a radio station consol built that way, why do those particular shapes make sounds and letters. I have an essay that attempts to describe a metaphysical meaning behind each of the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Are there similar meanings behind the fountain, the saxophone and the radio consol?
Einstein said that he wasn't particularly intelligent but that he was just very curious. Imagination and curiosity are the tools we all possess that can turn the ordinary, every day, hum drum things in the world into brand new landscapes.
DB - The Vagabond
**************************
Weekend Contest
Here we are a few days into Winter and I still don't have a Winter Question. I have some ideas but I open the meeting to anyone who would like to propose a good question to intrigue and inspire the readers to come up with interesting answers.
Thank you.
DB
***************************
Marcel Proust
*********************
The world is indeed a strange place.
Yesterday I went for a walk in order to purchase something I needed. The walk takes about 25 minutes. It is hard for me to walk even in the best weather but it was below freezing with a strong, bitter wind blowing almost constantly. About half way to my destination there is a pocket park which consists of a row of iron benches surrounding a stone structure. In the warm weather that structure is a circular pit with a fountain in the middle. It's a pleasant little place and in the summer the squirrels come and visit, looking for a handout, and the birds will perch on the edge and sometimes dip in to refresh themselves in the water. But now the fountain is covered over by a cloth which is tied down from the wind. It has the appearance of a ghostly object mysteriously sticking up from the empty pit around it.
I sat on one of the benches to rest and must have seemed to any passer as a spectral object myself, bundled up in my overcoat, sitting where no sane person would expect to be sitting in that weather.
I knew it was a fountain because I have sat there many a summer's day. But I wondered what someone would think of it who had never seen it uncovered and gently splashing with water. It resembled an unexplainable, mystical shrine of some pagan variety. One would have to imagine what it was and what it did.
Consider a saxophone. If you had never seen one before, never saw anyone playing it or knew what it was called, do you think you would identify it as a musical instrument. It's a twisty metal thing that comes to a point at one end, folds out into a well with a hole in it at the other end and in between are a bunch of holes, looking like an octopus's tentacle, with covers over them. Would your imagination tell you it was for making music or would it devise a different use, such as a planter for vines.
I had a friend who liked to visit me during my radio shift when I was a broadcaster. She would sit in front of the consol and just stare at the knobs, switches, buttons, meters and the strange inert but dangerous looking thing that stuck up into her face. She would ask me what this thing was for and what that thing did. She knew that the end result was a radio broadcast but that consol might just as well have been a wall in an ancient Egyptian tomb.
What about a foreign language? If you saw the characters of Hebrew or Arabic for the first time and didn't know it was a language would you imagine those funny looking squiggles and curves would render spoken sound, or letters, words, sentences, ideas?
I, like most people, have been fascinated with the strange objects of the world and, like my friend at the radio station, I want to know what this thing is, what it does and what it's for.
Once you know what a thing is and what it does you can start asking why. That's a delicious task for the imagination. What makes the water spout up, how does a saxophone work, why is a radio station consol built that way, why do those particular shapes make sounds and letters. I have an essay that attempts to describe a metaphysical meaning behind each of the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Are there similar meanings behind the fountain, the saxophone and the radio consol?
Einstein said that he wasn't particularly intelligent but that he was just very curious. Imagination and curiosity are the tools we all possess that can turn the ordinary, every day, hum drum things in the world into brand new landscapes.
DB - The Vagabond
**************************
Weekend Contest
Here we are a few days into Winter and I still don't have a Winter Question. I have some ideas but I open the meeting to anyone who would like to propose a good question to intrigue and inspire the readers to come up with interesting answers.
Thank you.
DB
***************************
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Wake Up The Dog
Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up interest wrinkles the soul.
Douglas MacArthur
********************
One of the troublesome facts of life is that there is more to know than any one person can possibly learn. But, depending on your point of view, it can also be one of the most joyful.
There are things that have interested me my whole life, and they still do. But there are other things that used to fascinate me and grab my attention like a cat jumping in my lap. Many of those things don't interest me any more. I don't want to know who won the World Series, who got an Oscar or when it's St. Patrick's Day. I couldn't care less.
But I'm glad that those former fascinations which have faded into the abyss of my younger years have been replaced by interests that I find even more important and enriching. I've always been interested in art and music, but these days I am experiencing them more perceptively and listening with more clarity and appreciation.
Subjects like history, philosophy, mathematics and religion bored me so much that I wanted to go out and make trouble. Now my floor is covered in books and magazines on those very topics. What happened? It wasn't just growing older and wiser(?). Something took me by the hand and led me gently into a garden of strange flowers and trees. I sat on a bench in this imaginary garden and was made to ponder my own lack of knowledge about things.
I had been a performing artist all my life and there is nothing endemically ignorant about that, (even though there are plenty of dolts in the profession). So what was different?
Something lived inside me like a faithful dog I was paying no attention to. All the knowledge I had gained was because I had to. To be properly prepared to perform in the theatre an actor should know as much as possible about the circumstances of the play and the production, taking care to know exactly what is being discussed. The research that a conscientious actor does reveals a great many new things, new knowledge and experiences, a broader view of the world. Otherwise the actor becomes entrapped in an ever shrinking circle of his own enthralling ego.
So I considered myself a fairly well educated fellow, knowledgeable about human behavior in all it's heroic and diabolical nature and adept at portraying that behavior. But there was something definitely missing.
I found it when I retired, or actually even before I retired which may have been one of the reasons I did. Quite by accident, I thought, I began to open books about subjects I knew almost nothing about and was fascinated. Existentialism, Set Theory, Judaic and Islamic studies, English novels, serial music, 20th Century European history, the obelisks of Heliopolis, the list goes on. The point is something rang the alarm bell and woke up the faithful dog sleeping at my feet.
Now I want to know it all. I never will, of course, but as much as I can I will learn things because I am interested in everything and incurably curious. It is discovering a new trail through the forest, meeting new friends, a love message in a bottle washed up on the beach, entering a room in your house you never knew was there, finding a silver nugget among the pebbles, following a great thinker's journey to a surprising conclusion, writing words that shine with beauty, hearing silent songs.
There are no wrinkles in my soul.
DB
*************
May Spring come quickly to your heart.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Weekend Puzzle - The Answer
12 pear were hanging high
12 men came passing by
Each took a pear and left 11 hanging there.
How is this possible?
-------------------------
Each is the name of a man, Sir Phillip Each of the Cornwall Eaches. He took the pear.
The Blogspot Tigers win the day.
First prize of a genuine aluminum pear tree goes to Just Plain Bill (Bill that also comes with a book: "The Care and Feeding of Partridges")
Second prize of the partridge itself goes to Val.
Good job folks.
-------------------------
The weekend isn't over yet so here's a Sunday Puzzle. This is a tasty one.
XW VCHFRYCH LKL WHF XRHJCFZLXCQ.
NZFRL QZBRQ
Good luck
DB
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Douglas MacArthur
********************
One of the troublesome facts of life is that there is more to know than any one person can possibly learn. But, depending on your point of view, it can also be one of the most joyful.
There are things that have interested me my whole life, and they still do. But there are other things that used to fascinate me and grab my attention like a cat jumping in my lap. Many of those things don't interest me any more. I don't want to know who won the World Series, who got an Oscar or when it's St. Patrick's Day. I couldn't care less.
But I'm glad that those former fascinations which have faded into the abyss of my younger years have been replaced by interests that I find even more important and enriching. I've always been interested in art and music, but these days I am experiencing them more perceptively and listening with more clarity and appreciation.
Subjects like history, philosophy, mathematics and religion bored me so much that I wanted to go out and make trouble. Now my floor is covered in books and magazines on those very topics. What happened? It wasn't just growing older and wiser(?). Something took me by the hand and led me gently into a garden of strange flowers and trees. I sat on a bench in this imaginary garden and was made to ponder my own lack of knowledge about things.
I had been a performing artist all my life and there is nothing endemically ignorant about that, (even though there are plenty of dolts in the profession). So what was different?
Something lived inside me like a faithful dog I was paying no attention to. All the knowledge I had gained was because I had to. To be properly prepared to perform in the theatre an actor should know as much as possible about the circumstances of the play and the production, taking care to know exactly what is being discussed. The research that a conscientious actor does reveals a great many new things, new knowledge and experiences, a broader view of the world. Otherwise the actor becomes entrapped in an ever shrinking circle of his own enthralling ego.
So I considered myself a fairly well educated fellow, knowledgeable about human behavior in all it's heroic and diabolical nature and adept at portraying that behavior. But there was something definitely missing.
I found it when I retired, or actually even before I retired which may have been one of the reasons I did. Quite by accident, I thought, I began to open books about subjects I knew almost nothing about and was fascinated. Existentialism, Set Theory, Judaic and Islamic studies, English novels, serial music, 20th Century European history, the obelisks of Heliopolis, the list goes on. The point is something rang the alarm bell and woke up the faithful dog sleeping at my feet.
Now I want to know it all. I never will, of course, but as much as I can I will learn things because I am interested in everything and incurably curious. It is discovering a new trail through the forest, meeting new friends, a love message in a bottle washed up on the beach, entering a room in your house you never knew was there, finding a silver nugget among the pebbles, following a great thinker's journey to a surprising conclusion, writing words that shine with beauty, hearing silent songs.
There are no wrinkles in my soul.
DB
*************
May Spring come quickly to your heart.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Weekend Puzzle - The Answer
12 pear were hanging high
12 men came passing by
Each took a pear and left 11 hanging there.
How is this possible?
-------------------------
Each is the name of a man, Sir Phillip Each of the Cornwall Eaches. He took the pear.
The Blogspot Tigers win the day.
First prize of a genuine aluminum pear tree goes to Just Plain Bill (Bill that also comes with a book: "The Care and Feeding of Partridges")
Second prize of the partridge itself goes to Val.
Good job folks.
-------------------------
The weekend isn't over yet so here's a Sunday Puzzle. This is a tasty one.
XW VCHFRYCH LKL WHF XRHJCFZLXCQ.
NZFRL QZBRQ
Good luck
DB
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Careful Composure 7/21/09
Nothing great was ever done without much enduring.
St. Catherine of Siena
***********************
I'm standing by.
----------------------------
Anyone who often reads Vagabond Journeys knows that I am a champion of the common man, a believer in the value, beauty and genius of the ordinary, everyday, average human being. I do not underestimate the remarkable achievements by remarkable people. But I am willing to recognize that my friends and neighbors are capable of remarkable things if the situation demands.
Yesterday I watched the celebration of the anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. The three astronauts involved all spoke. I noticed that none of them were very good public speakers. There were no orators in the group. But then I thought Why should there be? They are scientists, engineers, technicians and pilots. Oratory is not their game.
When Neil Armstrong came forward to speak he received a standing ovation from the audience. Again I wondered why he did and not the other two. Was it because he had done something remarkable that the others didn't do, or was it simply that he was the first person to do it. His name will go down in history as a great explorer. And yet when he spoke he showed himself to be an ordinary guy, like me.
Frequently the astronauts speak of the many thousands of people involved in the space flight history, of the thousands of nameless workers, ordinary folks like me, whose contributions made it possible for someone to walk on the moon.
Something else is talked of also, and that is the spirit of the Apollo program which inspired people to do their best, to dream, solve problems, design and build equipment and to make sure all the procedures were correctly carried out.
In his talk Armstrong uttered an amazing and troubling fact. He revealed that it was a mere 66 years between the Wright Brothers first flight at Kitty Hawk to the Apollo 11 landing on the moon. That's a amazing time line. Only 66 years. But it has been 40 years since the moon landing. What has happened since? The Apollo astronauts are old men now but they say they expected the program to continue to the moon and beyond.
I guess the International Space Station is a grand accomplishment, but, as someone pointed out, it's basically a political one. It doesn't have as much to do with space exploration as the Hubble Telescope. Why have 40 years gone by without further exploration? What happened to the spirit of Apollo? And what was that spirit in the first place.
Watching the Apollo 11 astronauts speak I wondered what it was that motivated those men to stuff themselves into a minute flying machine to go on a long journey they might not survive. The answer came listening to them and to others speak on the subject. There were two qualities that all explorers have had since humans first went where no one else had been: curiosity and willingness to risk one's life.
It is clear that taking off in a spaceship is risky business no matter what, but is risking one's life to install a battery in the space station the same as risking one's life to step on the moon? I don't think so.
Another quality the astronauts have is endurance, sticking to the job until it's done. In the case of the Apollo flights, it meant living in extremely cramped quarters for many days. A trip to Mars would mean living that way for months. How many people have the composure to do that? I don't think I do. I don't even like being on a bus for more than an hour. How long did it take Columbus and crew to travel on small, wooden bottomed boats to get here? We know what year he did it but I don't know how long it took. Do you?
(There are still some blank headed people who believe, like the Holocaust deniers, that the moon walks never happened, that it's all a hoax, . Sure, and Columbus never set foot on a new land either. His ship fell off the edge of the earth and we are not really here.)
Curiosity. Courage. Endurance. Those are the keys to our future. And we should get on with it.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
Pardon my polemics, please.
))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
St. Catherine of Siena
***********************
I'm standing by.
----------------------------
Anyone who often reads Vagabond Journeys knows that I am a champion of the common man, a believer in the value, beauty and genius of the ordinary, everyday, average human being. I do not underestimate the remarkable achievements by remarkable people. But I am willing to recognize that my friends and neighbors are capable of remarkable things if the situation demands.
Yesterday I watched the celebration of the anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. The three astronauts involved all spoke. I noticed that none of them were very good public speakers. There were no orators in the group. But then I thought Why should there be? They are scientists, engineers, technicians and pilots. Oratory is not their game.
When Neil Armstrong came forward to speak he received a standing ovation from the audience. Again I wondered why he did and not the other two. Was it because he had done something remarkable that the others didn't do, or was it simply that he was the first person to do it. His name will go down in history as a great explorer. And yet when he spoke he showed himself to be an ordinary guy, like me.
Frequently the astronauts speak of the many thousands of people involved in the space flight history, of the thousands of nameless workers, ordinary folks like me, whose contributions made it possible for someone to walk on the moon.
Something else is talked of also, and that is the spirit of the Apollo program which inspired people to do their best, to dream, solve problems, design and build equipment and to make sure all the procedures were correctly carried out.
In his talk Armstrong uttered an amazing and troubling fact. He revealed that it was a mere 66 years between the Wright Brothers first flight at Kitty Hawk to the Apollo 11 landing on the moon. That's a amazing time line. Only 66 years. But it has been 40 years since the moon landing. What has happened since? The Apollo astronauts are old men now but they say they expected the program to continue to the moon and beyond.
I guess the International Space Station is a grand accomplishment, but, as someone pointed out, it's basically a political one. It doesn't have as much to do with space exploration as the Hubble Telescope. Why have 40 years gone by without further exploration? What happened to the spirit of Apollo? And what was that spirit in the first place.
Watching the Apollo 11 astronauts speak I wondered what it was that motivated those men to stuff themselves into a minute flying machine to go on a long journey they might not survive. The answer came listening to them and to others speak on the subject. There were two qualities that all explorers have had since humans first went where no one else had been: curiosity and willingness to risk one's life.
It is clear that taking off in a spaceship is risky business no matter what, but is risking one's life to install a battery in the space station the same as risking one's life to step on the moon? I don't think so.
Another quality the astronauts have is endurance, sticking to the job until it's done. In the case of the Apollo flights, it meant living in extremely cramped quarters for many days. A trip to Mars would mean living that way for months. How many people have the composure to do that? I don't think I do. I don't even like being on a bus for more than an hour. How long did it take Columbus and crew to travel on small, wooden bottomed boats to get here? We know what year he did it but I don't know how long it took. Do you?
(There are still some blank headed people who believe, like the Holocaust deniers, that the moon walks never happened, that it's all a hoax, . Sure, and Columbus never set foot on a new land either. His ship fell off the edge of the earth and we are not really here.)
Curiosity. Courage. Endurance. Those are the keys to our future. And we should get on with it.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
Pardon my polemics, please.
))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Friday, June 26, 2009
Dangerous Diminishment 6/26/09
Iron rusts from disuse, even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
Leonardo Da Vinci
***********************
Hello again.
----------------------------
I believe in mental might. Years ago I read a statistic which claimed that on the average we use about 15% of our brains. I thought, then what do we do with the rest of it? Let it rust?
I decided to investigate the thinking of those who I was sure were more intelligent than I. While some of them, it turned out, were actually at the 10 or 11% level of mental use, there are some, such as Da Vinci, who were pushing at the limits of their mental usefulness. The common quality they all seemed to express was curiosity. Albert Einstein once humbly remarked that he wasn't all that clever but that he was just very curious. He also wrote "It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education."
Then I wondered just how much our formal education dumbs us down to our 15% capacity. I saw that it wasn't education itself, but the way it was presented. So much of how I was taught growing up was about incapacity, not capacity, of mental ability. I was taught what to think not how to think. If my thinking did not conform to the rules of the day, I was deemed "wrong," Once I got out from underneath the dictatorial dogma of public school education I learned that not only could I think for myself, but that some day I would even learn to think beyond myself.
It's a truism to say we are all capable of more than we do. But wisdom can't stop there. If so, how do we learn to do more? How do we increase our capabilities, our capacities for doing more? Fearlessly and unashamedly admitting our useless 85% is a good start. It's like owning a 100 acre plot of land and never venturing past the back yard. It's safe. It's easy.
One day in a life drawing class I was sitting next to a woman who stopped drawing at one point and put her pen down. I asked her why and she said that she didn't like the pose. I suggested that she should draw it anyway. If we only draw the poses we like we won't do much drawing nor will we learn much.
Mighty mentality can't be gained by sticking with the safe and easy. If I come to a thinker whose ideas perplex me I don't want to turn away and say "It's too confusing. I don't understand it." Rather I want to stick with it until I do. Curiosity and expansive thinking are what get me out of my backyard and into the fascinating forest beyond.
Vagabond Journeys
___________________
May you see something pretty you haven't seen before.
---------------------------
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
You have all summer to answer if you wish.
6 responses so far.
DB
Leonardo Da Vinci
***********************
Hello again.
----------------------------
I believe in mental might. Years ago I read a statistic which claimed that on the average we use about 15% of our brains. I thought, then what do we do with the rest of it? Let it rust?
I decided to investigate the thinking of those who I was sure were more intelligent than I. While some of them, it turned out, were actually at the 10 or 11% level of mental use, there are some, such as Da Vinci, who were pushing at the limits of their mental usefulness. The common quality they all seemed to express was curiosity. Albert Einstein once humbly remarked that he wasn't all that clever but that he was just very curious. He also wrote "It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education."
Then I wondered just how much our formal education dumbs us down to our 15% capacity. I saw that it wasn't education itself, but the way it was presented. So much of how I was taught growing up was about incapacity, not capacity, of mental ability. I was taught what to think not how to think. If my thinking did not conform to the rules of the day, I was deemed "wrong," Once I got out from underneath the dictatorial dogma of public school education I learned that not only could I think for myself, but that some day I would even learn to think beyond myself.
It's a truism to say we are all capable of more than we do. But wisdom can't stop there. If so, how do we learn to do more? How do we increase our capabilities, our capacities for doing more? Fearlessly and unashamedly admitting our useless 85% is a good start. It's like owning a 100 acre plot of land and never venturing past the back yard. It's safe. It's easy.
One day in a life drawing class I was sitting next to a woman who stopped drawing at one point and put her pen down. I asked her why and she said that she didn't like the pose. I suggested that she should draw it anyway. If we only draw the poses we like we won't do much drawing nor will we learn much.
Mighty mentality can't be gained by sticking with the safe and easy. If I come to a thinker whose ideas perplex me I don't want to turn away and say "It's too confusing. I don't understand it." Rather I want to stick with it until I do. Curiosity and expansive thinking are what get me out of my backyard and into the fascinating forest beyond.
Vagabond Journeys
___________________
May you see something pretty you haven't seen before.
---------------------------
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
You have all summer to answer if you wish.
6 responses so far.
DB
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)