First Blog

  The line between what is attainable and what isn’t is very thin.   Locating this line is but one step toward personal wisdom. Wisdom rescues truth from its failings. In the obscurity of personal darkness, many of us stumble into wisdom, changing us forever.

I have just put up a piece on wisdom, what it is and how to get it. Find it at the link below. https://www.linkedin.com/in/g-donald-allen-420b0315/detail/recent-activity/documents/

You want to be wise, the pride of your family or at the workplace.   So do I.   How to do this is a good question, but one that has a ready answer. You simply invent it.   Here we give methods with examples, all cooked up at home, none from the literature. We call it… Do-it-yourself wisdom .   You, too, can be wise with words. Recipes are available, and we take up a couple here.   For words, just pick two of them and mix in a counterbalance.   Or use one phrase to amplify another and then reverse.   Alliteration helps. Assiduity is not the goal.   Loose construction is better.   How the mind fills in what the words leave out is remarkable - and to your advantage. Think of a poem with just one line.   For example, let’s use “love” and “liberty,” and a few others. “Love is far less without liberty, and liberty is far less without love.” “The spirit enriches reason just as reason enriches the spirit.” “Knowledge needs intuition even more than intuition needs knowledge.” “Pray

The bridge from smart and wise to easy to see, but so difficult to cross. 

One problem with wisdom is that it compels you to make decisions you'd rather not make. On the other hand, without wisdom, you have more freedom to choose and therefore more free will. ---------------------- The same can be said about education and knowledge. The more you have the better you are able to solve problems, the less choices you have to select solutions even though more solutions can be offered, the less free will you have to make choices.  So, education works against free will.   -------------------- The seeds of knowledge combined together with with the seeds of experience, when cold-pressed, render droplets of wisdom. The residue is called textbooks.

Can you forgive?  It's not easy, you might agree.  If you wish to read a good article on forgiveness, please see   https://theunboundedspirit.com/forgive/ This article emphasizes that forgiveness requires strength, love, wisdom, and an open heart. My response.  While forgiveness requires energy as the article posits, failure to forgive implies maintaining a "resident" animus. This requires even more energy. It requires an action in life, an interrupt in daily living, and a vigil against intersection.  It requires the maintenance of a catalog of transgressions.  It loads the mind and soul with unneeded baggage. To be unforgiving and hateful both are a burden. I have found that of the binary possibilities, "forgive and forget,"  to  forget  is the easier.  Not up to the activity of forgiving, it relaxes energy requirements on the system and calms the mind. In a way, it resets a relation with only a small "black flag" attached. I use it a lot

Success involving good luck comes in equal measure to failure involving bad luck.  Sounds true, but is  it really? He had the wisdom of experience, not of intelligence.   Sounds true, but can it be really? Which is the more powerful motivator.:   Ambition or Politics? Politics or Power? Reward or Position? Action or Reticence? Beliefs or Money? Money or Power? Fame or Power? Answer.  Yes to all of them.  This is what make us so complex.  There is no simple order of priority. Mathematically, we not not ordered or even partially ordered.  Our motivations are not at all ordered much beyond ordering life or death. Even that has issues. To govern by regulations is just another form of dictatorship. 

Rational ignorance .  A state of mind where your analytical powers seem not to work and you know it.  This leads to an uncertainty of how to proceed.  It is an awareness of a state where you are powerless. It can affect your investment strategies, your job seeking strategies,  your relationships with others, or even your foundational beliefs.   Coming to grips with rational ignorance is but one step towards wisdom.  Know it. Understand it. Live with it.  Do all of these with the black flag of caution flying high.  Resist giving in to emotional responses, the alternative response. You have to just plain love this state.  This is certain uncertainty.   Delicious!

"The mathematician does not study pure mathematics because it is useful; he studies it because he delights in it, and he delights in it because it is beautiful." --- Henri Poincaré "A goal without a plan is just a wish."   --- Antoine de Saint-Exupery "The things that we love tell us what we are." --- St. Thomas Aquinas  " Experts often possess more data than judgment."   --- from the Internet “Wisdom begins with knowledge about knowledge.”   --- Anon. “The newest (and oldest) form of political thug promises bounty to the public while stealing from the cash register.” – Anon. "If you believe in sanctuary cities, you have a religion where you get to feel good about yourself, you don’t actually have to do anything, and others pay for your faith. " - Anon.  (Convenient!   The take-away here is that we mustn’t call the intellectual left stupid anymore.   They did dream this one up!)

The Police.   There is a strong movement toward which all police officers must wear body cameras.   The claim is that not only will such cameras deter abuse and other conflagrations of the law, but will document the officer’s daily activities.   The camera will create a log of all activities of this officer, and this is becomes a part of the officer’s permanent file.    A few consequences on the pro side include Documentation of abusive actions of the officer.  Clarification of charges made by the officer or by the perpetrator. A strict adherence by the officer to written procedures. These sound like a welcome relief to the critics.   And for about 1% of all police officers, it means that the tendency to abuse must be curtailed.   This sounds good.   However, there is a con side to this. 1.        As mentioned above, the officer’s permanent file containing all encounters will reveal all mistakes made, and there will be these.   2.        The camera will make the o