Socratic Life

THINKERS ANONYMOUS
This Story was found on www.thejaywalker.com

http://thejaywalker.com/pages/thinkers.html

Do You Think To Much?

It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought led to another, and soon I was more than just a social thinker.

I began to think alone – “to relax,” I told myself – but I knew it wasn’t true. Thinking became more and more important to me, and finally I was thinking all the time.

I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and employment don’t mix, but I couldn’t stop myself.

I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau and Kafka. I would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, “What is it exactly we are doing here?”

Things weren’t going so great at home either. One evening I had turned off the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life. She spent that night at her mother’s.

I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss called me in. He said, “Skippy, I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has become a real problem. If you don’t stop thinking on the job, you’ll have to find another job.” This gave me a lot to think about.

I came home early after my conversation with the boss. “Honey,” I confessed, “I’ve been thinking…”

“I know you’ve been thinking,” she said, “and I want a divorce!”

“But Honey, surely it’s not that serious.”

“It is serious,” she said, lower lip aquiver. “You think as much as college professors, and college professors don’t make any money, so if you keep on thinking we won’t have any money!”

“That’s a faulty syllogism,” I said impatiently, and she began to cry. I’d had enough. “I’m going to the library,” I snarled as I stomped out the door.

I headed for the library, in the mood for some Nietzsche, with a PBS station on the radio. I roared into the parking lot and ran up to the big glass doors… they didn’t open. The library was closed.

To this day, I believe that a Higher Power was looking out for me that night.

As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye. “Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?” it asked. You probably recognize that line. It comes from the standard Thinker’s Anonymous poster.

Which is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker. I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we watch a non-educational video; last week it was “Porky’s.” Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last meeting.

I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home. Life just seemed… easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking.

Now, I don’t read minds… But if I had to guess what the majority of Americans are thinking today, I would say that it is this, “How can I get what I want faster, cheaper and easier?”

Just look at how we communicate with each other when we are at work, driving a car or waiting for the bus. Man… I hate waiting. We are an instant gratification society. This is obvious through our disinterest of each other and our intellectually inquisitive sleepiness.

Ask yourself, when was the last time that you actually questioned what you do every day? Why do you drive the same route every single time to the grocery store? Why do you buy the same gas from the same gas station? Why do you buy the same brand of toothpaste every single time?

You may think not, but this is where it starts. That nagging feeling that you are doing the same thing over and over again without thinking about it. You are living habitually. We all do this at one time or another. You know, those times that you are driving and you get home and you think to yourself… “I don’t remember how in the world I got here.” We ingrain our daily living habits so far into our minds that we can practically do them without thinking.

What does this have to do with anything? Great question! In order to truly understand ourselves, we have to understand why we do things. How do we get better? How do I improve myself? Where do I go from here? How do I get to where I want to be?

These are the questions that we want to be asking ourselves. You see, when we get stuck in the habits of daily living, we are not fully awake. We are sleepwalkers in life. However, we can wake ourselves up by asking ourselves who we want to be. What is in our way of getting there? Why are we satisfied with mundane and simple crumbs of life, when we could be eating a feast?

I want to say hello to you as we start this journey into the rest of our lives. I hope that we can start today asking ourselves who we want to become.