Thinking well is in part about our willingness, our
courage, to embrace the unknown, to open ourselves to real understanding and the
uncertainty that surrounds that.
“Very few really seek knowledge
in this world. Mortal or immortal, few really ask. On the contrary, they try to
wring from the unknown the answers they have already shaped in their own
minds---justification, explanations, forms of consolation without which they can’t
go on. To really ask is to open the door to the whirlwind. The answer may
annihilate the question and the questioner.”
The Vampire Lestat, Anne Rice
Who better to instruct us in thinking than a vampire!
This fine quote aligns with my past posts regarding people accepting only
information that confirms their views, views which are deeply enmeshed with
their emotions, literally inseparable from them. A contrary position is seen
not only as an attack on their view, but also on the emotions supporting it.
Their egos (fragile things that they are are!) are now at risk, calling for a
counter strike to regain the “balance” of I’m right, you’re wrong. No truth, no
expansive conversation, no greater understanding, no thoughtful uplifting of
ideas, nothing….
The quote also offers a crisp and wonderfully insightful statement
of the dangers of really asking and really listening. “To really ask is to open
the door to the whirlwind. The answer may annihilate the question and the questioner.”
What kind of stuff is this, says our “thinker”? Poor soul, he is lost. The
reality and the truth are opaque to him. To grow as a person, and certainly as
a thinker, we must open the door. This is about barriers coming down, ones that
protected (sort of) our views, values, and positions from challenge, ones that
kept us from the truth about ourselves and the world---“safely” in the dark of
ignorance.
The whirlwind will separate us from our distorted views
of nearly everything, especially of ourselves. That is why it is so
threatening. But how can we think clearly if we do not understand the false stories
we have told ourselves about ourselves, acknowledge those, and undo them? How
can we think well if we fail to see the world as it is, as opposed to how we
want it to be?
The whirlwind is the loss of certainty and belief that
everything we think and do is just dandy. Even the door’s presence evokes fear,
but that fear is natural when we approach the door, and even more so when we
open it. Many cannot stand the force of reality, of the real answer to their
questions, and slam the door before they have to deal with the frailties they
have been so assiduously protecting and pretending do not exist.
Annihilation is the only way out of true ignorance, the
annihilation of our existing views. The new and the real cannot enter unless
room is made by destroying the old views. Fear holds many back as this new
openness appears like a disintegration of their worldview, a horribly
threatening event for many. But it is more like a reconfiguration of that world
view, one that creates us anew and allows us to see aspects of the world we had
never seen before because of our filtered views.
If we are not clear inside, we can hardly be clear
outside. Thinking well demands clarity, even if it is distasteful. That
distaste often holds us back from opening the door, as we prefer the illusion
of quality thinking to the often great difficulties of true quality thinking.
Do we have the courage?
