I Just Don't Know What to Think Anymore

In a recent thread concerning all the turmoil in American politics one member posted
''It's all so confusing, I don't know what to think any more"
At first this struck me as a familiar experience having been confused a number of times in my life. It is after all just a ''throw away line'' just a hackneyed cliche.
But then I stopped and thought for a moment that maybe the confusion was due to having been TOLD what to think for so long that when the messages on WHAT to think were contradictory it was the contradiction that would bring on the confusion.

So, maybe, just maybe, not knowing WHAT to think may be the first step
in learning HOW to think.

Think about it.

Will you?

Can you?

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

Greed, incompetence, apathy and confusion are fuel that drives American politics.

And there is no shortage of fuel for this bus. Hop on board.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

I like your idea. It's like when a man throws his kid in the water so that he is forced to learn how to swim.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

I am looking at WW I and WW II docs on the hows and whys. And there is so much that is not taught in schools, and this isn't opinion, this is verifiable facts.
We are lied to every minute of every day.

Freedom of the press is no longer possible. 6 major corps own the free press and control 90%+ of what everyone sees, hears and reads. Dangerous.

Don't know what to think, pick up USA today and have a major corp tell you.


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a reply to: TerryMcGuire

Freaking nailed it.

When you turn off the media and need to go out into the real world with real neighbors, the same scenarios don't apply.

Years and barrels of money have gone into bringing up the youth on what to think. Long gone are the teachings of how.

Yeah I like it too. I can get very existential at times a reply to: LesMisanthrope

Back in my day there was a song by Crosby stills and Nash titled Judy blue eyes I think it was. And at the end the song said do you think she loves you, do you think at all. And that made me thinka reply to: seasonal

I love it when simple things like that sometimes just popped inside your head. It helps us know we are alivea reply to: JinMI

Too many ideologies, philosophies, theologies and isms that are both contradictory and in agreement.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

So, maybe, just maybe, not knowing WHAT to think may be the first step in learning HOW to think.

Some old Greek dude had another approach. The first step toward critical thought is to try to understand why you think what you do.

To that end, he would ask his students a lot of annoying questions.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

The first step to knowing everything, is knowing that you know nothing.

But if I don't know anything, how could I know that?

Hmmmm...

originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: TerryMcGuire

So, maybe, just maybe, not knowing WHAT to think may be the first step in learning HOW to think.

Some old Greek dude had another approach. The first step toward critical thought is to try to understand why you think what you do.

To that end, he would ask his students a lot of annoying questions.

That are still annoying today

a reply to: underwerks

The view of old school pragmatics: You cannot know anything with any degree of certainty. The older I get, the more I am inclined to believe they were absolutely correct.

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire

But then I stopped and thought for a moment that maybe the confusion was due to having been TOLD what to think for so long that when the messages on WHAT to think were contradictory it was the contradiction that would bring on the confusion.

So, maybe, just maybe, not knowing WHAT to think may be the first step
in learning HOW to think.

That's brilliant. Thanks for the food for thought.

a reply to: riiver

It hit me that way too as it occurred. And the I thought, ''I have to share this''. Maybe someone else will like it to.
So thank you for that.


t

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
I love it when simple things like that sometimes just popped inside your head.

Thought just pops up - no one is thinking!

It hit me that way too as it occurred. And the I thought, ''I have to share this''. Maybe someone else will like it to.

It is easy to believe that 'you' think but really you are just aware of what appears. No need to worry about what to think - because thought just happens or it doesn't.

originally posted by: Itisnowagain

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
I love it when simple things like that sometimes just popped inside your head.

Thought just pops up - no one is thinking!

It hit me that way too as it occurred. And the I thought, ''I have to share this''. Maybe someone else will like it to.

It is easy to believe that 'you' think but really you are just aware of what appears. No need to worry about what to think - because thought just happens or it doesn't.

That may be. And the ''may'' may be for sure if we are living in a fundamentally random and meaningless it just somehow happened to be existence. And that is no denying that that may be the case. However even with that being the case, there is still the ''me'' or ''you'' who is noticing.

And it may be that for many people there really IS no reason to think because what ever it is that happens to them that they call thinking is as you say, just something that happens.

All of that said, I agree that at least much of what we think we are thinking as you suggest, just happens. I see this in myself. I go, ''what the # am I thinking about now or where the hell did that come from. But not all the time. I think that we, the observer of thought can direct that thought into either creations of our own or towards some more universal and cohesive sense of being.

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
All of that said, I agree that at least much of what we think we are thinking as you suggest, just happens. I see this in myself. I go, ''what the # am I thinking about now or where the hell did that come from. But not all the time. I think that we, the observer of thought can direct that thought into either creations of our own or towards some more universal and cohesive sense of being.

Yes - but 'you' do not think ''what the # am I thinking about now or where the hell did that come from." - that just pops up as well.
The observer just sees and hears - it does not direct thought - thought just pops up.
The observer and the observed (a thought appearing) arise as one seamless happening.
The knower and the known are one - not two.


The thinker is thought
Now, if we see the truth of that - that the thinker is thought, that there is no thinker separate from thought, but only the process of thinking - , then what happens? If we see that there is only thinking and not a thinker trying to modify thought, what is the result? I hope I am making myself clear. So far, we know that the thinker is operating upon thought, and this creates conflict between the thinker and the thought; but if we see the truth that there is only thought and not a thinker, that the thinker is arbitrary, artificial and entirely fictitious - then what happens? Is not the process of conflict removed? At present our life is a conflict, a series of battles between the thinker and the thought - what to do and what not to do, what should be and what should not be. The thinker is always separating himself as the `me' remaining outside of action. But when we see that there is only thought, have we not then removed the cause of conflict? Then we are able to be choicelessly aware of thought and not as the thinker observing thought from outside. When we remove the entity that creates conflict, surely then there is a possibility of understanding thought. When there is no thinker observing, judging, moulding thought, but only choiceless awareness of the whole process of thinking, without any resistance, without battle, without conflict, then the thought process comes to an end.jkrishnamurti.org...

"I think therefore I think I am what I think" ...........I had the thought to reply your post/thought and this is what is coming out. Now I have the thought, "but I am not this thought". Then the thought pops, "are you what you don't think?"
Then another thought arises, "these thoughts are very confusing"
Then finally non-thought returns.but.......
final thought for now, thoughts are not the ultimate. a reply to: TerryMcGuire

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

Then don't think at all.