On Thinking

It is now well known that for thinking, itself being a conscious activity, there is an unconscious source which controls it and instructs it with directives. Whereas the wisdom of our age has been quite successful in discovering and refining thinking as a conscious activity; it has been not very well able to sufficiently appreciate the subtle unconscious origin of it.

Thinking is an innate and instinctive activity. It happens sometimes without our awareness. The most primitive form of thinking I believe is the mythical and imaginative type that everyone practices right from childhood, which is refined and at times sustained during the maturity of mind through to adulthood. The maturity of mind is a stage of continual development which is reached by the arousal of an awareness of mind towards its own operations and workings. This is a stage where the mind becomes self critical and starts examining the values and beliefs of truth it has been holding dear, often very naively. It is a painful process. The consequences of this self examination of mind might seem very devastating, specially if it was educated with an arrogant rigidity and provided for sustenance with a dogmatist worldview.

It appears that the essential purpose of human thinking is self discovery and self valuation. Thinking being instinctive, is initially stimulated and contained within our own self. We tend to think while having our own selves at the heart of this process, and therefore when we judge, we judge according to our own capacities. So for maturity of mind and for expanding its capacities it is important to let free our thoughts in favour of being objective, in order for our thinking to happen independently of our self. This requires training and disciplining the mind, which means resisting the mind's tendency to concentrate selfishly on its own sense of self. This cannot happen however by way of force.

What is important in the process of disciplining the mind is inflating it with knowledge, but what is also important meanwhile is developing one's own insights. This should be done with caution and modesty. One's understanding of a matter should not lead them to believe that they have the final say in that matter, as this violates the imperative that human knowledge is always imperfect and human understanding always limited.

Mind must be trained to think purposefully. It should always seek for productivity and creativity in its works. It must also be remembered however, that thinking alone does not contribute to the development of one's personality and their outlook. Albeit being the only potent tool, thinking does not always shape our actions and deeds. There is a long way from thinking to doing. But then again its only via thinking that this long way can be conquered and paved.