#NotJust "Following": A Case for Thinking, Reflection and Listening
Reflections on the need for thinking for ourselves, for engaging in shared reflections on our shared past, present and future
Hello Dear,
How are you? I trust you have been doing, being and becoming good! Let me tell you, at the cost (or benefit? Or pure joy?) of repeating, that I once again feel so excited about the prospect of being able to think, read, write and share ideas. Indeed, the way to consummate this excitement would be to allow myself to become totally mad. Oh, how I wish I could so become, unmindful of the standards of unmadness which the world and the society expect us to adopt. Well, speaking of this, let me draw your attention to at least two earlier posts which are quite related to this theme of ideas and their relationship with madness.
Ha, so if you would like to “join the party” or the tribe, immerse yourself and drink copiously from the infinite cup of madness, do subscribe to this #NotJust email newsletter, One Doubt Please.
Well, that was not a sales pitch, and was not intended to be one. I don’t think I am good at selling, by the way, though there is a dominant school of thought that sales is a key skill necessary for life!
Now, I just now discover an interesting connection between the above two threads. We know that one of our deepest yearnings is the desire to belong, to associate ourselves intimately with a group, a community. Indeed, most of politics at national and the global stage is built on this very principle: the question of individual and group identities.
Yes, so it strikes me that:
Very often, we are ready and are but all too eager to sell ourselves - our ideas, thoughts, beliefs, values, principles - in order to gain or retain membership or to strengthen our position in a group or community.
Most of all perhaps, we find it convenient, comfortable and safe if the group or community could do the thinking for us. Well, #NotJust the thinking, but the speaking and the action as well. Well, this reminds me of our exploration of the dichotomy between actions and words, and the way the two are intertwined with each other.
Coming back to our point:
We outsource ourselves, our very identities and our lives - much more than we realize.
Yes, I think a fair share - maybe a very large share - of the problems we are afflicted with in both our personal, individual and our shared, collective lives have their origin, sustenance and perpetuation in our persistent inability, unwillingness and sheer laziness to do the hard and apparently painful yet eventually liberating and immensely joyful work of thinking for ourselves.
This reminds me of a reflection I have written.
[Beginning of a piece of reflection I wrote in June 2023]
The Inability to Think for Oneself, The Power of Thinking Independently
The power to think independently is a superpower.
Especially in this age of hyper-connectivity. I realize that a rather unnoticed or subtle outcome of our connected age is the atrophying of our ability to not just think, but to think for oneself. We have a heightened urge to "share" our thoughts with each other, to confirm we are right, to seek validation, to get others' opinions. All this leads to lazy and harmful thinking habits, and thus of ways of being and becoming.
We seek others' opinions, who may be happy to express agreement or appreciation, when they themselves may not have had the time to really understand and independently and honestly evaluate our thoughts. So, we fool each other, without necessarily plotting to do so, but as a matter of practice, as a natural part of our culture which thrives on "social proof".
This becomes especially harmful when we need to come out with new ideas and fresh insights.
Collaboration is good, but it often leads to groupthink and conformism rather than creatively challenging each other to push boundaries.
Moreover, we need quiet, reflection, solitude and the pain of taking the road less travelled - even and especially if we are alone and invisible. That is necessary for great ideas to emerge, and for great work to be done. In the shadows. In the recesses of our minds and hearts.
Attempting to - or thinking we can - shortcircuit this process is doing a lot of damage to our progress, I am thinking. We need the unique power of each individual to come together to create something bigger and greater than the sum of the parts. To begin adding, we need to have the parts first. But alas, we forget to assemble the parts, we directly proceed towards the addition.
This view is expressed by Apple Cofounder Steve Wozniak as well, who says that great artists work alone, not in teams. Hope to "share" more on this thought later. 🙂
[End of piece of reflection I wrote in June 2023]
Speaking of thinking independently, I am glad to share with you what a senior officer in Indian Information Service (a very kind and very lovable officer, I must say) told me yesterday. Asking me for an opinion on something, he said that “I am asking you since I know that you are frank in giving your opinions”. Of course, the idea is not to take or claim any credit for this, especially since how frank one is depends also on the environment, isn’t it?
To make a slight digression, a very interesting and related question is what we mean by the sense of humour. So, I remember one friend telling me 11 years ago, that I have a very good sense of humour. Understandably, the context for his statement was that he and others were having plentiful occasions to laugh in my presence. I however had to ask him in reply: maybe it is that it is you who have a good sense of humour? Of course, one can as well say both here.
Similarly, we can say that candour too is a function of multiple factors: the individual, the people with whom he or she is interacting, and the larger context of the interaction. Of course, there could also be a situation of candour which is non-contingent, where one is radically candid irrespective of anything, everything, anyone, everyone.
Ok, back to the question of thinking independently, I find that it is one of the most singular joys of life to be laughed at by the world at large. I mean, this can be especially empowering when you know in your heart that you are on the right track and acting and working towards what you believe is right. In such a situation, the world laughing at us can very well help you boslter your faith in the worth of your project; it could be a signal that you are up to something which is really good, maybe even revolutionary and world-changing, if not at once, but gradually, over a period of time.
It would be good to remember Machiavelli here:
“It ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them.” - Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince
It is also good to remember that we may have to move mountains, in order for ideas to move mountains!
“Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.” — Howard Aiken (h/t: Tim Ferris)
Of course, it could be that it is we who are in the wrong when the world laughs at us. That is why we need to always stay humble, open to correction, change, growth and learning and to always patiently consider what others have to say as well, without letting our ego coming in the way of our understanding and realization. Well, no easy thing, we can say, but once we realize it, it can in fact be very easy as well, I would think.
After all, what is it that we have to lose but our ego?
And of what worth is ego?! Isn’t it hilarious or rather tragicomical in fact, I mean, our human nature itself, that we so often cling to things - such as our inflated egos - which are absolutely worthless, and thus deny ourselves the priceless beauties and joys of life, such as the joys and excitements of deep relationships, pure love and the infinite bliss which comes from pursuing our genuine curiosities and making a tangible difference in the lives of our fellow beings?
Coming back to the privilege of being laughed at by others, I think you would find the following post interesting, where we have explored how groups can better encourage ideas, through encouraging the free and full expression of both absolutely obvious and absolutely out-of-the-world ideas.
Part of the trick in handling the potential pain of being laughed at, I believe, is to laugh with others, and to laugh at oneself. Indeed, I believe that:
The ability to laugh at oneself is a crucial life skill.
Isn’t it? At the same time, I do not mean to say that we should put up with contemptuous behaviour.
Well, coming back to the challenge of thinking for ourselves, a bigger challenge may very well be the challenge of thinking itself!
Here is an article written more than 7 years ago, which talks about “The Lost Art of Thinking in Large Organizations”.
“Many executives in big companies attained their positions by excelling at getting things done. Unfortunately, a bias for doing rather than thinking can leave these executives ill-equipped for their new roles….If your managers claim they do not have time to think, you have a problem. You need them to know not just that they have permission to take time away from doing to think — but that they are required to do so. The threat of not doing so is clear. In other words, a singular focus on what made your company big risks preventing it from sustaining that growth in the future.”
Yes, organizations that prioritize doing at the expense of thinking often fail to identify and capitalize new opportunities.
Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it - Henry Ford
Well, like a thriller movie which has a radical revelation and overturning of the storyline in the end, (even though this article may not have been like a thriller movie😊) let me share now what I regard as a departure from the paradigm of independent thinking which I have been advocating thus far.
Yes, we need independent thinking - badly so; equally important is shared thinking, interdependent thinking.
Yes, I firmly believe that it is absolutely esssential for all of us to continually engage in a shared reflection on the issues which matter and which should matter to our shared past, present and future. And this engagement and reflection should be undertaken at multiple levels - at the level of each group, such as family, community, profession, sector, nation and the world and humanity at large.
One very vital source of inspiration for me in coming to adopt and sustain this belief is the great management scholars Late C. K. Prahalad and Gary Hamel, both creative contrarians. Here is an excerpt from their 1994 management and strategy classic, Competing for The Future [I have read a fair share of this book a few years ago].
Here, the authors say that on average, they found that senior managers spend less than 3% of their energies on building a shared organization-wide perspective on the future.
Well, therein lies the immense need for and the huge untapped potential for adopting the paradigm, philosophy, practice and process of shared thinking.
Tell you what, I started this post, inspired by the thought that a lot of problems in our life stem from our mindless act of “following” the crowd, of going by what others are doing, rather than based on a sound, scientific, humble, shared, wise, independent or rather interdependent point of view and perspective of how and what should be. As it happens almost always, I end up writing about something else. So, let me come back to this topic later, in another post.
Before we close, let me share one more piece of reflection I have written recently.
[Beginning of a piece of reflection I wrote in June 2023]
A Rather Unlikely Reason for Listening to Yourself
Dear,
0) A thought which struck me just now, during the course of my reflection about some of my existential struggles, well #NotJust my exisential struggles in fact...
1) We have often heard that we must learn to listen to oneself. The question arises why.
Why must one take the Himalayan trouble to listen to oneself?
2) Many reasons are and can be advanced. My effort here is not to go over all such reasons, but only to reflect on a reason which struck me just now...
3) A very basic question which emerges here is, whether we can listen to anyone. Is listening possible at all? I do not think the answer is an obvious yes, let alone "obviously, of course", as some of us may be inclined to think.
4) Of course, the answer depends on what we mean by listening, to begin with. And on what are the standards we set for this activity. Well, is it an activity, or is it rather a state of being and becoming?
5) Since I plan to sleep shortly, let me trim this thought short. What I propose is that no one listens to anyone! Haha, abolute nonsense? Well, I think this conclusion may be ineluctable if we set the bar for listening as quite high.
6) Even those closest to you may be able to listen to you when you are down, but when you really find and live your true self, it may well be too radical for anyone, especially those closest to you, to accept what they get to witness!
7) This is all the more understandable if we accept the proposition that everyone is insecure! (Are they? I used to think that some people are secure, but someone recently told me that no, no one is secure.) If so, our insecurities prevent us from taking leaps of faith, where such leaps may demand that we let go of our beliefs which have served us well in the past. Our fear of success conquers our fear of failure, and we hold on to the tried, tested and beaten path, so to say.
8) And by extension, just like no one listens to you, you too don't listen to anyone. To their greatest ideas, to their true moments of inspiration. Of course, to the commonplace concerns, we all do listen, at least we listen better.
9) If this be so, we have one strong argument for listening to yourself, which appeared to me as rather new, even though in hindsight it may not be so. The idea is that:
Since no one else will listen to you, to your best ideas, at least you yourself need to listen to yourself!!
10) A further extension of this argument is that if someone does listen to you, it means that you have not yet questioned all dogmas and broken all rules which you need to. I had recently written about this idea.
11)
So, listen to yourself! Spend time to reflect, contemplate, meditate. You may very well be the sole audience you may ever get.
I hope that the sanity of this message exceeds its extremities, especially since this is based on an extreme conception of the concept of listening, leading to quite extreme conclusions. Good night!
[End of the piece of reflection I wrote in June 2023]
How did you find this article? Does it add some value, provide some inpiration? Please let me know in the comments or at newdheep@gmail.com. Thank you! And please also let me know what other topics you would like me to think and write about. - Dheep.