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“The most useful piece of learning for the uses of life is to unlearn what is untrue.” – Antisthenes
We all would like to believe we are thinking for ourselves, but honestly, we are not.
For most of my life, I can tell you, I have hardly been thinking for myself. It hurts to admit this to yourself, but the sooner you do, the earlier you can see things clearly.
Even the brightest and smartest minds are barely thinking for themselves. I am not saying this to degrade anyone, this is what is “normal.”
Usually, our thoughts revolve around the ideas and beliefs we’ve been programmed with. Nothing else.
And this has nothing to do with knowledge or intelligence but has everything to do with honesty and clear-seeing.
Thinking is a Destructive Process
“All thought is immoral. Its very essence is destruction. If you think of anything, you kill it. Nothing survives being thought of.” – Oscar Wilde
A lot has been said about the value of creative thinking which implies creating something inside your mind. However, this kind of thinking builds upon assumptions you have most likely not validated for yourself.
Thinking for yourself, on the other hand, is questioning the assumptions you are basing all your thinking on.
It’s a destructive process. It’s ripping away layers upon layers of delusion. You’re falsifying everything you have taken as true for years.
I want to emphasize, however, that this is not about right or wrong, and good or bad.
There is really no other reason to think for yourself other than a desire for cutting through delusion and belief.
So the one prerequisite for this kind of thinking is pure intention which comes in the form of a strong desire for truth. You have to be willing to face all the self-delusion you have built up over the years.
Beliefs are destroyed through illumination. Lies disappear when you really look at them because they never had any substance in the first place. They were only imaginary.
This is no small thing. This going to war with yourself, and you’re both sides and the battlefield.
You have to understand that all the beliefs and knowledge (which are really just beliefs as well) are part of your ego structure.
Hence, each belief you are unmasking as an untruth is like cutting away a piece of yourself. So attacking beliefs you have held for many years can be quite painful.
Why Would You Want to Think For Yourself?
“Most of one’s life is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself thinking.” – Aldous Huxley
This seems like a silly question but it’s important to be clear on this.
When you start to think for yourself you are messing with your worldview. And after seeing things more clearly, your previously pleasant life could seem like a big fat lie to you.
It’s like being in a beautiful dream and suddenly your alarm is waking you from it. Not necessarily a fun thing.
Yet, cutting away beliefs is also a liberating process. Sure it might hurt, but afterward, you feel lighter, like carrying less unnecessary baggage.
You must know that unchallenged beliefs can define you and determine the course of your life.
The more beliefs you free yourself from, the clearer you will start seeing everything around you. You’ll see how easily you took things at face value, especially from people or institutions you regard highly.
So much of what we think to be true, we have never questioned and all of it is vastly limiting our experience of life.
Although many of us seem to be aware of the rat race and the status quo, we are still chasing it.
Why?
Because everyone is doing it.
It’s easy to be part of the herd. It’s safe and secure and comfortable and doesn’t demand you to take an honest look at yourself.
This is not to say that you need to leave society and live in the wilderness. It’s about seeing what is happening and how it’s happening to you and everyone else.
The more you are thinking for yourself, the harder it will be to accept anything others want to sell you as “truth.” This will lead you down a path to discover what living life truly means for you.
You’ll no longer accept the regurgitated version of life society considers normal.
How to Think For Yourself
I know, I know, telling someone how to think for themselves seems the opposite of thinking yourself. I agree.
So this is not going to be a step-by-step process of thinking for yourself but a suggestion on how you can start.
There is really not much to it though.
You simply take a statement you believe to be true and then try to figure out exactly why it is false.
And unless you have stated a negative (no belief is true), made a subjective observation (my back hurts), or wrote the only true thing you know (I am), it is false.
But don’t believe what I’m saying here. It’s important that you do this for yourself. Otherwise, you’ll just have added a new belief to your box of beliefs.
Start With All the Spiritual Stuff
“Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.” – Matsuo Basho
Restocking the belief box is what happens a lot in spirituality.
Only because some guru, saint, sage, or mystic said something we automatically believe it without taking another look.
I mean, after all, they seem pretty wise, right?
Most of us, especially if we have been into spirituality for a while, have no problem with accepting, for example, that we are consciousness and that consciousness is all there is. But few of us validate (or invalidate) this for ourselves.
This is how spirituality becomes another delusion.
Spirituality is supposed to be a way to liberation but for many it becomes the opposite.
In some sense, spirituality is the most devious lullaby because you think you’re awake and you’re making progress toward freedom while in actuality you’re just decorating your prison cell with spiritual stuff.
One example you can see quite often is the belief in past lives and reincarnation. Whether there is reincarnation or not is beside the point.
The real question is why are we believing it in the first place?
Many of us might think we are progressive and open-minded when we believe in multiple lives but let’s be honest.
Is this not just a way to avoid the brutal honesty of death? A way to avoid facing futility? Or even a way to avoid facing our failures in this life, by saying, “Well, if I fail in this life I have another try.”
This is spiritual bypassing 101.
By dreaming about future lives, we’re avoiding the only life that really matters. And that is the one we’re living right now.
Anyway, your spiritual beliefs are a good place to start.
They quickly lead you to all the juicy stuff concerning life and death which we usually avoid looking at with honest and open eyes.
I hope I didn’t let this all sound too grim because in the end thinking for yourself is about waking up for real. Not the false awakening, where you wake up from a dream just to find yourself in another dream.
This is about being a lucid dreamer and being the master of your dreamworld.
But, again, don’t believe me. Think for yourself and wake up.
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“My barn having burned to the ground, I can now see the moon.” – Taoist saying
Luka
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