How to Become More Curious

[aly4519]

I know it sounds silly, but how do I become more curious about things around me?

My surroundings (my office, the hallway, my living room) are unchanged. You can say that every moment is different than the last, but that's not true.

I understand the idea of 'noticing' physical sensations, including sights, sounds, etc. But the idea of becoming more curious about these things? Perhaps I'm missing something.

[JonW]

Here's something to ponder the next time you take a sip of coffee.
Every time you take a drink, your actions are intimately connected with everything else in the physical universe. The implications of Bell’s Theorem suggest that when you drink from that cup, every atom on every star, even in the most distant galaxy, behaves in a way other than it would have had you not picked up the cup. What you do now at this very moment changes stars in the most distant galaxy – at the very same moment you do it. Indeed, what you do changes everything in the universe in the same instant you do it.
Such reality ordinarily escapes our awareness because all such changes appear random.
But everything that has ever happened or will ever happen influences what you are doing in this moment. What you do now, in this moment, effects a change in everything that has ever happened in the past and everything that will ever happen in the future.
That's one reason to be curious.
Cheers,
Jon

[aly4519]

that is really amazing! But that one idea probably gets old after a while, no?

[JonW]

Well, that would depend whether one is paying attention or not. Or perhaps it depends on the quality of the attention.
Everything is in constant flux. Nothing remains the same for even a split second. The wall you're looking at, it seems solid and unchanging but it's not. All of the matter around us – that sofa, that chair, those walls, you and me – is almost totally empty. The only reason we can’t walk through walls is that atoms are linked together by the electromagnetic force. It's all an amazing atomic dance.
Trinh Xuan Thuan writes, "We are all made of stardust. As brothers of the wild beasts and cousins of the flowers in the fields, we all carry the history of the cosmos. Just by breathing, we are linked to all the other beings that have lived on the planet. For example, still today we are breathing in millions of atomic nuclei from the fire that burned Joan of Arc in 1431, and some of the molecules from Julius Caesar’s dying breath. When a living organism dies and decays, its atoms are released back into the environment, and eventually become integrated into other organisms."
Given the infinite wonders of the universe, I sometimes wonder how we ever get up off our knees.
Cheers,
Jon

[KathleenH]

Your surroundings may be the same as in the physical environment but the sounds are not the same, the temperature, the light...

Have you really looked around you? Do you actually see things or just glance at them in your periphery? Try really looking at things, noticing how the light reflects off a glass of water, how a drop moved down the side of the glass.

The room may be the same room but it's always different.

[aly4519]

These are all great points. My only concern is that they tend to result in more thinking than noticing!

[jdandre]

Jon made some great points above that I wanted to build on. His comments naturally led me to the concept of "interconnectedness" (made popular - to me at least - by Thich Nhat Hanh). It can serve to evoke curiosity.

Interconnectedness is reflected in the famous quote by Carl Sagan

If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.

This quote is simple in its premise - nothing exists without everything else, and what exists now is a result of events that stretch back further than we usually consider.

That apple pie isn't just the culmination of a few ingredients and an oven - those ingredients and that oven are made up of a myriad of other things, which are made up of a myriad of other things, and on and on.

In Sagan's summation, you can trace back all of the causes and conditions until you reach the origin of the universe. As he points out:

The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are all made of starstuff.

Thich Nhat Hanh's - master of interconnectedness - says the following:

There is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud there will be no water; without water, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, you cannot make paper. So the cloud is in here. The existence of this page is dependent on the existence of a cloud.

Our normal mode is to look at objects (such as a sheet of paper) and consider them separate and distinct from everything else. Hanh's quote encourages us to change that perspective. The sheet of paper is not separate and distinct, and it would not exist without the cloud that brings rain. He adds:

Let us think of other things, like sunshine. Sunshine is very important because the forest cannot grow without sunshine, and we humans cannot grow without sunshine. So the logger needs sunshine in order to cut the tree, and the tree needs sunshine in order to be a tree. Therefore, you can see sunshine in this sheet of paper.

Taking the time to mindfully examine a sheet of paper - something you see every day - brings insight to the interconnectedness of everything. He continues:

And if you look more deeply...you see not only the cloud and the sunshine in it, but that everything is here; the wheat that became the bread for the logger to eat, the logger’s father - everything is in this sheet of paper.

You can take this even further, and consider all the things that ultimately gave rise to the logger's father. And all of the things that gave rise to the wheat that became the bread for the logger to eat.

Pick something and perform the same analysis!

[JonW]

Excellent stuff, jdandre. A brilliant post, sir.
JWW

[aly4519]

yes, jdandre, that was awesome!

but it comes back to my more recent question. Being this curious I imagine would likely result in more "thinking," no?

[jdandre]

Thanks Jon W.

We should all strive to match the level of helpfulness you provide on these forums.

Hi aly4519, you asked:

Being this curious I imagine would likely result in more "thinking," no?

But thinking isn't bad - it's getting caught up in thought (or, as Tolle puts it, "lost in thought") that's unskillful.

Thoughts happen - they come and they go. Don't try to stop them - just learn not to become attached to them. Learn not to follow them down those familiar paths that lead to conditioned behavior (decisions, actions, reactions).

You don't have to control your thoughts, just stop letting them control you. Once you do that - by learning not to indulge them through meditation and mindfulness - you're better able to focus your attention, time, and energy where you want it...in this case, exploring what makes you curious (mindfully).