Curiosity seems like something everyone understands, yes?

It has greater depth and breadth than people usually consider, and is perhaps even more primal than intellectual motivation. We don’t just want to know new things. We are driven to see, hear, and experience new things. This drive is so strong it transcends even the pleasure principle. We are often willing to endure discomfort and even sometimes strong distress to satisfy our curiosity. This would not seem practical, if it were only an intellectual motivation.

I give value to discretion. Ah, well, one can experience intrigue about the principle of discretion as well. See depth in it as a guiding principle that perhaps other people don’t see, but perhaps an example is in order.

Even for people who are normally very selective in what they will give attention to, there come times in which a chronic event or stimuli drives them to attend to it, even if at first they had no desire to. But it’s still a function of the most basic conscious drive.

I think that’s when the phrase “curiosity killed the cat” comes in? Interesting point and that modern aphorism is actually spawned from a misquote of Shakespeare. He originally said, “Care killed the cat.” Care meaning worry. Cats are notable for having an almost universally skittish temperament. In fact, curiosity, rather than being the cause of worry could very well serve as its foil, but as human beings we think in such an obsessively abstract way that we cut ourselves off from our instincts. Curiosity is the motivation to engage in any way, shape, or form, and literally every life form with even the most rudimentary cognitive functions exhibits some form of curiosity.

How is curiosity the cause for worry? Oh, curiosity is not the cause for worry. What I said is it would be the cure. Worry being more truthfully an aberration of the drive of curiosity than its expression.

We’re worried about things we don’t know well, so curiosity to find the truth would fix that? We substitute worry for curiosity when we feel we are better served by disengagement. When we live a life full of “I had better not”. In my observation, this is actually more the psychological norm than the exception. How many people live in a way where they feel like they can trust their own experience and perception?

There is a lot of doubt and denial. Yes, and in the presence of this almost universal attitude, worry is the norm rather than the exception. Has this improved our function as human beings in any way, really?

Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.

Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~