An incredible resource

I wrote 2 blogs about curiosity a few months back. See them here. http://davegerber.blogspot.com/2011/04/set-your-camera-down.html
http://davegerber.blogspot.com/2011/05/ability-to-see.html

I wanted to write a few more thoughts I had.

In my experience, curiosity can be described in a number of ways, all of which can prove to be resourceful to someone seeking an unprecedented future.

The approach I want to look at today deals with looking at curiosity in terms of interrupting one's judgements about oneself and the world around him/her.

As humans, we are meaning making machines. Our mind seeks to make sense out of the world we are living in.

And so an event occurs: someone cuts us off, a friend betrays us, we say something to someone that we realize we should not have.

And then we make assessments or judgments around the events. If someone cuts us off, we think, "You jerk, what is wrong with you!" Without stopping to think that there may be a good reason that person cut you off. (There might not be a good reason, but we have pretty much covered that possibility by flipping the person off and swearing out the window, as if they care.) Perhaps, it is a soon-to-be first time father driving his wife to the hospital as she is in the middle of labor...

It is probably not, but it might be.

A friend betrays us. We perhaps think negative things about her. Without getting clarity on the entire story. Perhaps there is more going on than meets the eye, and if we checked in with her some things might open up.

Curiosity provides us with the ability to interrupt our judgements. To be curious as to why the person is cutting us off or in a hurry, why our friend betrayed us, or why we are so judgmental of ourselves. Curiosity allows us to as "why" in a way that communicates that we truly want clarity on the situation and then can alter our response from there.

Curiosity is one of the most resourceful elements that life has provided me.

Start by noticing your assessments, then start a thought with "I'm curious as to..."