Pathwalking 122
There are signs and omens all around us, and we often miss them.
Yes, I am about to get hooky-spooky on you, but please stay with me. Once more I am going to explore an incredible paradox of our existence.
Last week I wrote about the importance of critical thought. I explored why we all need to not just act, but really give time and energy to analysis and critical thinking, before we form opinions and make various decisions.
However, on the opposite side of that coin, we ALSO need to learn to read the omens better. We need to recognize the signs and portents, and we need to learn to better recognize our instinct and how we react to the world.
Psychology and sociology often explore the notion of nature versus nurture. What are instinctual versus learned behaviors? When do we lose sight of the things we simply KNOW and put more emphasis on analysis and study?
As children we develop the ability to critically think along the way. Young children have a sense of instinct and know how to read the natural world in ways adults completely cannot conceive. As we get older, and are taught not just thought, but HOW to think, we lose our ability to know and read the natural signs of the world.
What on earth are you talking about? Science has been exploring for decades the notion that animals have certain instincts about the world around them. For example, birds take flight before a storm, or dogs seek shelter before an earthquake, or other wild animals seem to avoid getting caught in a tsunami. They simply KNOW something is coming, and they react.
We also have instincts built into us, but we are taught to ignore them, and to give more thought to any given subject. We forget how to read the omens, and the only language we readily recognize is that of the native speakers around us.
Paulo Coelho spends a great deal of time in his book The Alchemist talking about “The Soul of the World” and the “universal language” that ALL creatures, every animal, vegetable and mineral speaks. Despite the fact that this is a work of fiction, there is truth in the concept.
Once more we return to the fact that EVERYTHING begins with the same component – energy. We are all energy in form, and so is everything else both seen and unseen in our world. As such, we are all one, and we are all connected.
Still with me? The point I am getting at is that we need to remember how to read the signs, how to see the omens of the world around us, and also apply critical thinking to our lives. Before we form our opinions and develop our ways and beliefs, we need to not just intellectualize our world, but FEEL it as well.
I don’t know anyone who has not experienced that sensation of KNOWING you were right. You had this notion, this idea, this FEELING about something or other, and when it was proven there was a deep satisfaction in the premonition of it. It held up to your analysis, it withstood all tests before it, and you came to the realization you had always known. It feels perfect, it feels great. All the stars are aligned as you knew they would.
That is heeding the omens, and listening to instinct and recognizing signs and portents. They are not always these immense abstracts like you get in religious texts or prophecies or great works of fiction. They are, however, there, all around us, and we can learn to better sense them, recognize them, and act upon them.
Of course, as with most paradoxes, we need to strike the balance. Seeing omens and signs and portents and acting strictly on instinct can have unintended consequences just as much as over-thinking and over-analyzing can. But critical thinking about what you are feeling can bring you to the place you most desire to be in life.
Life is a mix of thought, of idea, of feeling, of action. These things brought together make our daily lives happen. It is the energy exerted that takes an idea and turns it into an invention. It takes the concept, makes it a prototype, which leads to the device that expands the possibility for generations to come, whether in a physical or other manifestation. Sometimes we can read the signs, sometimes we need to critical think about and explore the notion, and when these come together we can change the world.
Know that there are signs and portents and omens, and remember that once we knew how to read them easily. They are still there, and always will be, and it is good when you are walking your chosen path to be able to read them.
Do you follow the omens you encounter?
This is the one-hundred twenty second entry in my series. These weekly posts are specifically about walking along the path of life, and my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. Feel free to re-blog. Thank you for joining me.
The first year of Pathwalking is available in print and for your Kindle.
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