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Inside the Box

Boxes. Things I've learned about people and their boxes.  The box metaphor for thought is well described and most appropriate.  Most people do live in some kind of box, though few will admit it.

  • a. Some people cannot think outside the box; moreover they can't think inside the box either.
  • b. Before one can think out of the box, he/she must first learn to think inside it. 
  • c. Some people think only inside the box. Indeed, they live in their box with the lid tightly closed.
  • A thought-box is a shield from unwanted ideas and thoughts. It protects and maintains a personal security. For many, it is a needed construct for day-to-day living. It provides the type of life assurance only babies have.
  • Some people construct a big, a huge box for thinking. It resembles a cathedral, with a foundation and floor, with walls, with buttresses, topped off with a cupola, and protected by a wide moat. This makes their thought free from assault by new ideas or even old ideas. Usually, there are no windows. Once constructed, they become prisoners within it - for life.
  • Many people limit their thinking to the box best described as a catechism. It covers all needed arguments and counter arguments. It is one of the most secure boxes. It is safe, almost free from siege. They are safe within their mainstream of consciousness and free from outside alternatives.
  • Many people that live in the box deny or reject there are other boxes. Intercommunication between two boxes is impossible.
  • Box thinkers are often smug believing they have discovered the ultimate box, i.e. the truth.
  • Box thinkers don't take intellectual risks. Box thinkers fear risks.
  • There are liberal and conservative box-thinkers. They don't talk much to each other.
  • However much you think you think outside the box, all your thoughts are contained in the bigger box, the capacities or sandbox of your brain.
  • You are not thinking outside the box if all you achieve is a small variation or addition to something well within the box. 
  • "New" does not imply "outside the box"  thinking.  It doesn't imply good.  It doesn't imply worthwhile.  Just "new" has little merit in itself. 
On the plus side of all this, thinking inside the box is thinking within a stable environment. It creates a predictable world where eventualities can be calculated and considered. Thinking outside the box creates a “newness” of unknown implications and unknown possibilities.

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