The Greatest Lesson of History

When I recently came across the saying that the greatest lesson of history is that we do not learn the greatest lessons of history, I knee-jerked. Of course, humans are just not smart enough to take advantage of the obvious benefits of knowing history, and the fact that it repeats itself. If only everyone else got that.

Then, a few days later, it struck me. What if you changed the sentence to the following: The greatest lesson of my life (or my personal history) is that …

You fill in the rest.

And once you have the answer, ask yourself what you have learned from it, and how it has affected your life.

By the way, the greatest lesson of my life occurred on January 31, 2000. That day, I started to understand time. 

On being wrong

Watch Kathryn Schulz on the personal rightness bias - a wonderfully accurate analysis of an inherent human condition. Her description of the rightness bubble we all tend to operate in is a great example of how limited our horizons typically are.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/kathryn_schulz_on_being_wrong.html

Let it grow

Any guesses at what specifically cracks the case in Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax movie?

The protagonist, a boy who wants to save the world in order to get the girl (which, in my experience, is just about the only reason any young guy does anything proactively), breaks down the city wall, which has been containing his fellow townspeople, with a bulldozer. The crowd is amazed – there IS a larger context, and in light of it, a different path forward is adopted.

And, the hero gets the girl.