THINK


Today is the birthday of Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847), known as one of the greatest and most prolific inventors in history. His mind imagined all kinds of miracles, and then created them, helping to change the world in very significant ways. This quote from him is perhaps a little cynical, but it always gives me pause, as I wonder which group I fall into. How often do I just "think"? Synonyms include ponder or meditate. Are they really such rare practices in our world?
One thing I believe is that our world has become very noisy, and noise is a foe of thinking for most of us, at least worthwhile or productive thinking. We bring a lot of that noise upon ourselves; we have televisions, radios, and music players playing much of the time, trying to direct or control our thoughts. We don't know how to listen to the world around us, or even better, to listen to our own minds. We have forgotten "the sound of silence."
The founder of IBM, Thomas J. Watson, famously simplified Edison's philosophy to a single word that was the company motto: THINK. He also observed, "Machines might give us more time to think but will never do our thinking for us." So true. Are we using our time appropriately?
I #GiveThanks for chances to just think. I hope we all seek opportunities to do more of it.



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