The Art of Thinking

Silly me, but I used to be ardently against the modern cellphone. What positive insanity, I thought! After all, who would want to be bothered with phone calls and text messages while running about town, doing errands, or driving down the road? Couldn’t all things wait until a body returned home?

And so it happened, that while the rest of the world was running about talking into a rectangle and swiping on a screen, I was entertaining myself with pen and paper—and thoughts. Lots, lots, and lots of thoughts.

“So you mean to tell me,” people would say, “that you don’t have a cellphone?”

And being the old-fangled soul that I am, I would say, “People are much too hooked on their phones. I think being bored is good for a person. A mind needs time to think, you know. It’s healthy.”

Everyone would sort of shrug, unconvinced—at which point I would add that I did technically have a phone, even though it was hanging on my wall with a crank. Unusable, I fear, as the inside had been gutted out and replaced with a secret shelf.

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I lasted until sometime last year, at twenty years old, when practicality overrode my strong opinions and I purchased a phone. And yet I still feel—and perhaps always shall—that thinking is an art we should never give up.

Never, ever.

For you see, our mind needs exercised like anything else. Oh, how shall we ever know what to expect in a future soul mate if we never take the time to at least half imagine him? And how shall we ever form good opinions, without stealing from those around us, if we never give the matter some thought? And can’t you agree that anyone’s life could be a bit brighter if they only gave way to a hint of imagination?

So even though our cellphones are truly helpful, entertaining instruments, and even though our TV screen brings loads of enjoyment, and even though a thousand things in life can capture our attention and consume us…

Don’t forget to think.

To go sit alone somewhere and ponder.

To take a walk and imagine as broadly and wildly as you please.

Because as simple as it sounds, thinking is an art. For heaven sakes, do not let it be a lost one!