Think for a minute.
How much time do you really spend in silence, just thinking? I am not talking about the kind of reflecting that you do on your drive to work, in the shower or even on your 1-mile afternoon jog. I am referring to the kind of reflection that you do on a day’s retreat, ensconced in a space where there is silence.
You are not listening to music, you are not reading Fortune 500, you are not watching the news, you are not twittering. You are simply thinking.
How much time do you spend doing that?
A quick survey of my friends indicate that too few do. It’s easy to understand why. Who has the time? In our treadmill society where everyone (family, friends, employees) wants their needs taken care of at the same time, it seems that modern day thinking demands that we be always be in motion. The quiet, reflective kind of pondering appears to be a luxury for which few of us have the coins.
But is it really? Thinking is the way we actively develop new ideas, invent strategy and get creative. It’s one of the hardest things for people to do, let alone do well.
Recently a friend who owned a small technology firm told me that he was going to close up shop and take a sabbatical. I was green with envy. Not many of us are willing and able to make such a complete mental shift. But it was only after speaking with him that I realised the process of thinking requires a kind of discipline that allows you to see that it’s real value lies in asking yourself questions relevant to your life and then considering the range of possible answers.
“I had been thinking of making a switch for a year,” my friend said, “every month I took half-day to see how it would work, the impact it would create. and to examine my options.”
My friend never found easy answers.
“At first, most of my questions led to other questions, but I trusted the process .”
Turns out that generating definitive, single-pointed answers is the result of only one kind of thinking. The second, perhaps more powerful kind of reflection, as in the case of my friend, leads to less answers and more, you guessed it, questions. And that’s okay.
To help his process my friend gave himself a timeframe. He accepted the answers at the end of a 12 month process. Another way to come to a conclusion, I suppose, is to ponder upon something until your original question yields no further questions. In my case, I accept an answer only when it profoundly illuminates my original question. It’s must be a true light bulb moment.
I am still a big believer in my Ideas Jam Day, even after 11 years in business. On that day I switch off my cell, I close off all the external noise and I think. Who do I want to be? What would I like to have? What should I share more of? How can I be more effective? What is the bigger meaning to my life?
These are my questions. I hope they get you thinking.
http://www.mangomediacaribbean.com/blog/trackback.cfm?0CF3DF77-B02D-F833-C3532229C1476CB5


Good blog! I'm currently reading The Monk who sold his Ferrarri, and it not only emphasizes the importance of stopping the frenetic pace of our lives so that we might 'think', but it also gives good techniques on how to do so. I would say a good read for anyone who wants to start thinking again.
'we labour under the belief that we have to think up what we have to do. the truth is it's not our responsibility, because the pattern of things is far greater than what we can imagine' But if you condition yr mind to be always listening you'll hear your life...I'm not saying you gotta sit on your hands and be passive and wait for the universe to drop everything in your lap, listening takes practice
I guess what I'm saying is the pattern of things is already therefrom the start and our job is to discern that pattern, listen for it and give it room to emerge, but most of the time we are to busy trying to make things happen. Its a kind of faith and yes faith is bloody unreasonable. But if ya pushing and shoving ya way through life you wont hear what you are suppose to.
Gee this is turning into a thesis. but I don't want to leave you to think to much about what or who you're listening to..derek walcott said it best in one of my all time favorite poems 'love after love'
the time will come
when with elation
you will greet yourself arriving at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the others welcome
and say sit here, eat
you will love again the stranger that was yourself
give wine, give bread,give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger that has loved you.
there are two more stanzas in this poem, but you get the drift right..
happy listening...
Without silence there can be no music. Music would be senseless if it did not have pauses.
In the same way our thoughts have spaces, and in the very fabric of our lives.
Once we can recognise the space and the noise, we develop a joyful detachment from things. When this happens, stress becomes a concept that is as real as much as you struggle against the tide of the world.
Take time out...it is the most important exercise that you can ever perform.
Get off the thought train!
The interesting thing is, in this world information comes to us sooooo fast that most of the time we react rather than think things through. Sometimes we are in so much of a hurry that our information gathering is poor and hence the core of our analysis is also flawed.
My humble opinion really suggests proper thinking is directly linked to proper information gathering and time must be given to both of them so that effective decisions can be made. In other words we should take time to read ,listen , ask questions, see, taste, feel, smell and connect with to our inner self (spirituality and emotions) so that our thinking can be wholesome, developmental and rewarding.
Nikola's and my ruminations so well.
Nikola focused on listening but I don't think you can do that effectively without thinking, so I get your point about information analysis and the need to gather facts by utilising the full sensory range. Processing that information may be all about reflecting and this gets to the heart of Nikola's point on listening.
It's an outer and inner process.
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