The Mind Turns on the Passive

The underchallenged mind is on a search-and-destroy mission, and the target is us. We confront it by insisting we can figure out that tyrannical problem in our lives. By trusting there is a solution, however laughable it may seem now. Resolving to hunt for it rather than wither in the heat of hopelessness. Fostering a knowing that defies current reality: that if anyone will get to the other side, we will. These are the thought processes that enlist our higher intelligence and are the means to the ends we say we want.

The mind needs an opening, and that invitation is our total faith in its ability to present us with a way out. All hope is lost only when we decide it is. If we are firmly planted in the it is impossible, too expensive, and too far gone corner, we tell our brain to stand down; there’s nothing to do here. It dutifully obeys, and the problem persists unsolved, but only because that’s the outcome we chose.

When we steel our resolve and refuse anything other than what is possible, we will find a way. We have to know, like we know our own names, we can. It’s then that we unleash the mind and “the how” begins to dominate our thinking and becomes the fire that fuels our intuitive thoughts. Ideas indifferent to approval.

Precedent is also irrelevant. It feels like a limit, but it isn’t. People continually accomplish things that history, credentials, or consensus conclude can’t be done. That conclusion doesn’t stop the world from changing. It stops minds from looking. To accept it is to become one of the ones who stopped. Even “maybe” is better than “can’t,” because it charges the brain with creating a blueprint.

The worst place to look for solutions to our problems is in the random, ill-thought-out opinions of others. They can’t help us, and we would be worse off if they could. A near stranger’s answer would solve nothing and would set us back, compounding our confusion. Only our own mind carries the history and complexity of the problem. We need to trust it for the tough questions in the same way we do for the smaller things. It can handle “how do I solve the problem I think I can’t solve” as easily as it does “where can I find a coffee,” if we let it.

The untested mind doesn’t idle; it looks for something to consume. Without complex thought to chew on, it consumes whatever’s nearest. Fed on scraps, the mind thins. Passive consumption is not neutral; we lose our capacity for nourishing thought. It dulls the instincts we need to feel alive. It dissolves our ideas with its mind-numbing repetition. If we’re going to evolve, we have to give our brain more meaningful jobs to do before it atrophies, weak from lack of use, into hopelessness.