The phrase is from Matthew 21:16 (and Psalm 8:2) and refers to the often unfiltered, direct nature of children’s speech. Adults usually have layers upon layers of filters, screens, masks, and agendas, reputations to manage, status and standing to maintain. All well and good and perhaps even necessary at times, however with all that social calculation we often lose both clarity and simplicity.
Sometimes it is helpful to strip away everything, go back to the basics, focus solely on what is essential, the elementary, fundamental elements. In the simplest terms, why are we on this earth after all? What’s it all about Alfie? Or as the poet George Eliot said, “What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?”
When we go to the ultimate mountain top, and take the longest possible perspective, much complexity falls away. What will you remember in your rocking chair days? Will this moment of stress really matter in a decade? Heck, next month? Not saying don’t give and do your best, merely that maintaining a sense of balance helps keep us effective, cool, calm, composed, collected, and centered.
Closing Quotes:
“Seek simplicity and distrust it.” – Alfred North Whitehead, 1861–1947
“Clarity comes from simplicity and elimination.” – Leo Babauta, Zen Habits
“Focus on the fundamentals. Master the basics first.” – John Wooden, 1910-2010
“As you-strip away layers of distraction and unessential habits, you reveal a core of profound clarity and focus.” – Marcus Aurelius, 121 – 180 AD
“The only simplicity for which I would give a straw is that which is on the other side of the complex—not that which never has divined it.” – U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1841-1935
As always, I share what I most want and need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier
Note: Every effort has been made to properly source any 3rd person material. I am, however, a voracious reader. If anyone finds any unattributed material, pls let me know asap and I will be delighted to give credit where credit is due.
“All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749-1832
