Courage

by T. M. Beeker

Created on: November 22, 2007

Wisdom without action is meaningless. To know and not act is the worst kind of cowardice. Wisdom is knowledge based on experiences. To at some point decide to learn nothing more is accepting limited wisdom excluding new experiences. On some debates thought back and forth can consume the better part of a day. On this topic however, the answer is simple. Courage is the essence of all great human endeavor. It is the foundation of evolutionary steps taken to change the known. Courage is the action that changes our whole concept of what we accept as wisdom.

Scientific and religious wisdom dictated to us that our world was the very center of the universe and with such a chosen place any other ideas were heresy. Therefore, common wisdom held fast for centuries threatening those who would question it. Until men of courage stood forth to present their findings and question the order of things. Some gave their lives while others would recant in order to preserve theirs. In each case change occurred and knowledge advanced into new vistas creating a new accepted wisdom.

One word the media likes to toss about is that of 'conventional wisdom', which is their indicator of what is popular and acceptable to the mass of people. These same masses who will shake their heads at violence, sex, moral decay while tuning in to watch it. This 'wisdom' is packaged by the media to convince us that technology in the hands of corporations and governments is a sure future of plenty and pleasure. Such thought makes it easier to market and control 'wisdom' in opposition to free thought which requires the courage to question what is in favor of what could be.

I distrust anyone who thinks they are wise. It has been my experience that experience is best at making one wise. And as I experience life I realize my wisdom is a realization of ignorance in search of truth. Truth does not live in a static world that media and governments ascribe to. It is that knowledge which looks unflinchingly at our world and then acts to make it a better place. Keep in mind change is uncomfortable and often requires that we sacrifice long held wisdom in favor of trying and failing until we get it right. Such is the reason why many would rather slumber under the umbrella of wisdom than muck about in the unexplored territory of new experience.

Our greatest thinkers very often had to challenge long standing wisdom to make sense of the world. Socrates who extended thought was branded not wise but a deluder of the young. DeCartes who thought and realized that was the essence of existence. Had he accepted the wisdom of his era the world would today be a different place. Einstein was according to conventional wisdom lousy at algebra and would not amount to much. He is the father of our future beyond this solar system because he challenged the wise and used mathematics to prove his case. Each person questioned the wise counsel of their times and had the courage to seek new knowledge beyond the comforts of currently held wisdom.

In my own life this quote is my own reason for choosing courage over wisdom, "A hero dies a single death, the coward dies a thousand times." In life my big mouth and courage to question has cost me, yet to accept the wisdom of things as they are would cause me to die a little more each time I remembered my failure to speak out and act. We are here because those before us had the courage to question and seek something beyond what the 'wise' of their times said was dangerous or did not exist at all.

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