h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest." - Confucius

Once again something I agree with! Learning wisdom by reflection means thinking about things - one's own mind is the most powerful instrument for discovering wisdom. My dictionary defines this meaning of 'reflection' as 'careful thought, especially the process of reconsidering previous actions, events or decisions'. So ... reflecting on what you - or anybody else - did, or on things that happened, thinking about them - such as what they meant, why they happened, what factors were involved in them, what effects they had, or how they could have been different. Thinking means not taking things for granted and not just passively experiencing things. Thinking means mentally involving yourself with everything. This does not necessarily lead to wisdom - but wisdom is impossible without it. It is 'noble' because it is something rare and precious. Not many people know how to think ... or put any sort of effort into thought. It was that way back in Confucius' day and it is still that way.

The second method is imitation - and as Confucius says, it is the easiest. But 'wisdom' can only come from imitating wise people and then again, not by slavish imitation. Wise people lead by example. People who take note of such an example can thus easily come to some form of wisdom. Often it is better not to copy the behaviour but to deduce the *principle* involved in the behaviour, and then behave according to that. Dmitri had a posting about heroes, and one of the things I said there is that a hero shows us that things we might have thought of as impossible, are actually possible. So a wise person can behave in a way that, if we look at 'regular' people, seems quite extraordinary ... we might see examples of patience, examples of compassion, examples of foresight, and other things, that we never might have imagined possible before we saw them. And having seen them, we can imitate them.

If we recognise a wise teacher, even just by repeating his or her words we take a bit of that wisdom and make it our own. But again, this must be done with understanding rather than mere thoughtless imitation. In our world it can still be a useful thing to be a 'follower' ... many leaders started as followers. Sometimes you have to listen to a person who knows better and just do what that person says, provided that person is one that sets an example that you recognise as knowing what he or she speaks of. So, imitation *can* lead to wisdom. But it is easy, and easy is not always the best thing. Far harder is the next part ...

Experience ... the bitterest method for gaining wisdom. Experience means striking out one's own path, trying things out for oneself, not knowing whether it will work or not. So, experience usually involves lots and lots of failure. Such failure is often traumatic... not just the idea of having failed, but failure can and does have negative consequences - harm to oneself and others, setbacks, opportunities squandered, lost forever. But there's success as well! I have a sort of a rule that one success is worth anything from nine to ninety-nine failures. There's sweetness in succeeding after lots of failure. But the wise man or woman can learn as much from failure as from success! Sometimes more. There's a saying, 'nothing fails like success'. Some people succeed so much that they get a distorted view of their own abilities. Many times they succeeded because they were the one out of a million lucky ones ... not from profound personal virtues.
That's active experience ... doing things, trying things, working. Then there's passive experience ... things that happen to one, irrespective of one's own efforts. These things can be happy - but, once again, they are often unhappy - often quite disastrous. Once again, the wise person can learn as much or more from negative experiences than from positive. One learns stoicism ... bearing up under adversity ... but more, one learns to appreciate the good that there is. Once again, after much adversity there is sweetness when circumstances relent and one can again relish existence rather than endure it.

And the more one experiences of life, the Universe and Everything, the more knowledge one has - provided one reflects on these things as said before! Everything is a guide to understanding everything else. One learns of the world and also of one's own self.

But like Confucius says, it can be very bitter, all the traumas of our experiences in this world. In fact for all of us, sooner or later there ultimately comes something that we cannot overcome in any way, an experience that will utterly defeat us - death itself. But rightly pondered, the bitter can make the bits of sweetness of this life seem even sweeter.