The Way Things Work

So I'm in the middle of reading "Timbaland: The Emperor of Sound" and he starts by talking about his childhood. He wasn't doing well in school and his father is telling him that music is just a hobby and that he needs to focus more on his studies. I could write a whole other blog on that, but some other time perhaps. 

Timbaland goes on to start talking about Thomas Edison & Benjamin Franklin as they were both recognized as doing poorly in school despite their life's great achievements. Thomas Edison, a notorious daydreamer, went on to invent the lightbulb, the motion picture camera, and the phonograph, which led me to another thought. I have two Masters degrees and couldn't tell you anything about how any of those things work. We get into cars everyday, with no real understanding of how any of those mechanics work (unless, of course, you're a mechanic) and drive without the slightest notion of how we're accelerating, braking, and so on. 

We have grown so technologically dependant (phones, GPS, etc.) and yet, I bet most of us couldn't tell you how any of the things in our lives actually work. We just use them without question, which I'm sure is hurting us more than helping us. 

We don't question any of it; we simply consume without informing ourselves. Now, I know what you might say, "How do I have time to inform myself how all this stuff works? I have to work, go to school, etc." And that's true, yes. But think about ALL of the things we simply accept in our lives, without question.

I say all that to say this. Maybe if we took more time to understand how things work, we would also be more mindful to understand how people work. In a time when people seem more hateful and judgmental than ever, perhaps a lesson in how and why things work would lead us to question the same about people. And perhaps, just maybe, if we took some time to get a better understanding of people, we would practice a deeper level of compassion and understanding. 

Perhaps the reason people are so divided lately is because most people are simply blindly accepting what is instead of questioning why it is what it is or what made it that way. Maybe we're getting closer to a time that in order to keep going, we have to start understanding the way things work.