“The only thing we really have to offer each other is inspiration. We cannot give people anything. We can only awaken them to something within themselves, and this is not done with argument, but by example.” —- J. Kennedy Shultz, “A Legacy of Truth”
Having facile face to face communication has become a lost art. Have you noticed? Engaging in conversation where listening and not reacting is the active response, has become lost in most situations, not all. In the exchange of ideas, where levels of offensiveness, incompatible speech, incoherent responses, impassioned retorts based on assumed positions, careless dismissive attitudes, segmented understanding, and repeating habits of robotic innuendo contributes to a troubled, unsettled and chaotic society/culture. Whether you are communicating or trying to, with your acquaintances, associates, colleagues, family members, friends, or complete strangers, the exchange of ideas shouldn’t be an exhaustive, challenging, or argumentative experience. There can exist a meeting of the minds, in consciousness, providing there is a mutual compatibility in respect for the other point of view. This can be said another way through the words of Albert Einstein, “Out of clutter find simplicity, from discord find harmony; in the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.”
Recently, the attention span of most individuals is 3 to 5 seconds given the prevailing technology. Rather a sad commentary and may only continue to get worse. Having had the experience as an educator, in dealing with students at various grade levels including college, it becomes more perplexing to understand how far we have fallen from substantive communication in such a relatively short time. Challenging young minds via critical thinking is almost absent today in education, substituted with what to think and not how to think. What role models do our younger generations look to in seeking a higher level of consciousness that will carry them forward in self discovery? Eckhart Tolle suggests this . . . “The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence.”
To be self directed through understanding who and what you are, and why you are here is not beyond the capability of any individual. The seeking begins from within, and is nurtured by those who enhance, enrich and embellish that process. To be your own person takes a great deal of courage, understanding, intelligence, and willingness to challenge, respectfully, those who don’t share those same principles. This has never been an easy task, it was never meant to be. There will be those who will pull you in many different directions, however, Howard Thurman thinks of this in another way, “There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself. It is the only true guide you will ever have. And if you cannot hear it, you will all of your life spend your days on the ends of strings that somebody else pulls.” JLR