Just Thinking

Are you aware of the way you usually think? Although this question may sound a little weird – even inappropriate perhaps, it is not. Why? Reaching a real level of understanding of the information presented on this website requires you to… silence your thinking every now and then. Requires you to be receptive to the broader picture of the information presented to you and to simply to ‘see’ and grasp what you’re being introduced to. Day-to-day thinking won’t get you there. True understanding calls for just thinking.

One of the most limiting thinking habits is to fit everything you encounter in what you already know. In case you agree with it… you discard it since there’s nothing new in it. In case you don’t agree… you discard it: it’s all nonsense. This thinking habit is ‘rather’ limiting: it very effectively prevents you from learning anything.

A less limiting thinking habit is you being open for anything new. But…, usually left implicit, you somehow require the new ‘thing’ to be explained by means of concepts you’re already familiar with. In case the new thing is marginally new… you might come to understand and even appreciate it. However, in case the new thing is qualitatively new… you will definitely not come to any true sense of understanding since you simply lack one or more concepts essential to the new ‘thing’. Unfortunately this mis-understanding doesn’t always quickly and/or clearly surface. It may take a while to notice that something strange is going on.

In order to create an understanding of qualitatively new things, you need to ad-just and to silence your thinking. You need to apply a kind of thinking silencer that prevents you from fast judging. Every judgment closes your thinking space further down and effectively prevents reaching an understanding of the new ‘thing’. Silenced thinking keeps you receptive – open to all possibilities – and enables you to simply to ‘see’ and grasp what’s really being presented to you. And at the very moment you ‘see’… you reach for your thinking capabilities again – to thoroughly work things out and understand.

So… in order to benefit most from the whole idea of an Information Roundabout as presented on this site, you are kindly invited to silence your thinking and to start just thinking at all these moments you get some touchy sense of “What’s new here?” or “This can’t work?” or “What an annoying nonsense!” or “What’s this all about?”

November 2011, Copyright (c) 2011 – Jan van Til/Information Roundabout

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