Be a Columbus to whole new continents and worlds within you, opening new channels, not of trade, but of thought.
- Henry David Thoreau, naturalist and author (1817-1862)
Set aside what we know today that Thoreau had no way of knowing, that Columbus was a merchant explorer, not a great discoverer. Columbus is known, by reputation, rightly or wrongly, as one of the greatest explorers and discoverers of all time.
So what is he doing in your head? Maybe messing with history a bit.
Thoreau, never one for great cities, set aside the life he had known in town (Concord, MA) to build himself a little cabin in the woods beside Walden Pond. He left society for a little over two years to explore possibilities that had been suggested by his friend and mentor, Ralph Waldo Emerson.
He went to explore whole new continents and worlds within himself. In addition to becoming one of the founding fathers of the environmentalist movement in the US, he became what in our simple way of thinking we call a philosopher.
He thought about himself, about the people he had known, about life, about the relationship between people and their environment, about the future of the world. Most of what Thoreau wrote was in notebooks that survived when he died shortly after returning to town.
Thoreau was considered to be a strange duck who would rather be by himself than to be with others and have to conform to their acceptable forms of behaviour. During his lifetime, he published one book that sold poorly (200 copies) and one that received only a little more recognition (2000 copies sold). Few in his time wanted to read the words of the strange man who became a hermit in Walden Woods.
Today he is adored not as a philosopher, but more like a great poet. His thoughts are pearls that are studied by every student in the USA and in many countries of the world. His legacy of thought far exceeded his accomplishments in life.
He took time to think, to sometimes do nothing in a day but think, or to watch eggs hatch in a bird's nest. All day.
His voyage of discovery of the continents and worlds within him can be the role model for us who could only dream of emulating him. Emulating the best of him.
Alas, he died too young, likely as a result of malnutrition because he didn't eat enough. He may have thought that people could learn to survive without food if they had enough self discipline. That's one theory. If so, his final experiment was one from which we can take lessons about minimums of nutrition needed for life. All kinds of nutrition, not just bulk of food.
His greatest lesson? To me, it was to take time to think. If not, we simply follow the trail someone else has prescribed for us.
A well trod trail that is.
Bill Allin
'Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems,' striving to encourage everyone to explore the possibilities within themselves, to break new trails by taking time to think thoughts that can only come with time.
Learn more at http://billalliin.com
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Comments: 16
I have examined my life, and I always examine my motivations for my actions. I try to examine and visualize how I, my actions and reactions effect others. I didn't start out this way, but this is the road I am on now.
Marilyn
A sister is pretty strong peer pressure, but it's really no different from the pressure from a drug dealer on the street in terms of how it should affect you.
Marilyn, you are so right. Do you suppose that somehow some people are trying to make our lives so hectic that we can't find time to think? Just follow? I don't know how this could be done, but then...maybe somone thought about it long enough.
However, I am finding that more and more people are taking the time to think about what I write and what others write on Gather, then to express themselves in comments and even more articles. I think this is healthy.
Another thought I had while reading your post relates to boredom. When people complain of being bored, they always attribute the boredom to something external--"this is a boring town," or, "he's a boring person." In fact, bordom is never extrnal, it's the consequence of not being mentally engaged. People who recognize they can control their thoughts aren't troubled with boredom. When they become aware there's not much interesting going on, they find something to be interested in.
Sometimes taking time to think means first taking time to relax the brain so that it is ready to do some serious thinking. In other words, it needs to vegetate for a while as it recovers from some challenging work done previously. We have no way of evaluating how much of a challenge a school lesson is with each child, for example. For one it might get her warmed up while for another it might prove mentally exhausting.
Just doing and thinking nothing leaves the mind room to explore thoughts that are unusual, even unique. If the brain has the ability to become engaged, that will come.
The brain should not be constantly at work. Very little that is creative comes from a constantly occupied mind.
You are so very right about boredom. First, only boring people get bored. People are boring because they don't know enough. The more people know, the less likely they are to be bored. And the more likely they are to find something to engage their cognitive functions with.
We might want to explore how people (who are naturally curious as young children) lose their curiosity to the point where they don't want to learn any more. I know this happens in school, but I won't get into that here because I wrote a book about it.
It takes a good teacher to restart that engine. Many who don't have that good teacher stick with television trash as ways to fill their time with useless pap. Don't misundestand, there is lots of excellent stuff on television, but boring people find it too much (mental) work to watch those things.
When I am done writing a piece, if I have followed my gut, I tend to feel more grounded in the world. I feel more in sync with myself. I grok the particular moment, the particular time, the particular place that I am in.
Thanks, Bill, for reminding me how important those hours are.
<<Very little that is creative comes from a constantly occupied mind.>>
I would say very little comes from a mind that is cluttered and unfocussed, or obsessively occupied. And you're right: being able to not-think is sometimes just as valuable as being able to process information productively. Being able to disengage from mental task that take energy and create stress is restorative.
<<We might want to explore how people (who are naturally curious as young children) lose their curiosity to the point where they don't want to learn any more.>>
While quality education has a lot to do with it, it's hard to underestimate the importance of parental models and parental attitudes. Parents empower kids to think and be creative (or not) from Day One. Parents give kids permission (or not) to use their minds actively. Some parents teach thinking, problem-solving, and creativity by example from Day One; others punish kids for trying.
Aptitude and IQ testing have a place in schools, but classroom performance is never determined by how smart kids are; it's always tied to whether or not they had parental permission to use their smarts, and whether or not they had good models for problem solving and creativity in pre-school years. A good teacher, imo, doesn't teach subject matter. He/she teaches kids, and sometimes parents. When parents are doing things right they need to be supported; when they're part of the problem a good teacher can often find many ways to intervene constructively.
Those hours are critical.
Thank you for your comment, Tom.
What courses in parenting? The ones I have proposed in 'Turning It Around.' See my web site to learn more about this whole concept, including an implementation plan.
I believe our fast paced society, technology, and the communication age has taken a toll on our ability to think, in more ways than one. Sadly, the most obvious casualty is the imagination of the younger generation. I like what you said, that "only boring people get bored". It is tragic that our youth require constant mental stimulation from an external source, or they will complain of boredom. I beleive this is mostly a result of computer and video games that require little imagination on the part of the user. All the action is available with the push of a button. Take away the button and the child is at a loss as to how to entertain herself. I remember as a child spending hours alone and with friends, not with toys or sophisticated props, but with only sticks from the yard, or rocks, or even mud, having the time of our lives. We pretended these things were other things. We traveled to far away places, accomplished impossible missions, and experienced adventure beyond compare simply with the use of one tool, the human imagination. Has this become an old fashioned idea? To our children, it has. How sad that the future of our world, our youth, find the very idea of taking the time to think and using the greatest tool we have, the human imagination, boring!
I don't want to blame anyone for anything. Technology is not at fault for anything, it merely serves a purpose to entertain those who may lack the ability, curiosity or interest to use their brains for other purposes.
I believe that you and Tony have the right idea. Challenge the intellect of children, in the absence of other stimuli. Then give them technology or other resources to explore what they want to learn. It works. I have used this method successfully many times. I suspect that Tami and Tony have as well.