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[ | [[File:Wonder-awe-beauty-universe-nature-inspiration-divinity-spirituality.jpg|thumb|This person is not actually experiencing any awe or wonder they are just faking it for the camera, as is so often the case in our [[social media]] driven [[society]].]] | ||
[[wikipedia:Wonder_(emotion)|Wonder]] refers to the sense of [[beauty]] and awe that you get when interacting with the cool parts of the [[universe]]. <blockquote>''"Wonder is the feeling of the philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder."'' -[[wikipedia:Plato|Plato]]</blockquote>Experiencing wonder and associating it with the [[god concept]] helps you develop a universal sense of [[optimism]] and [[automatic mindfulness]]. | |||
[ | == Inspiration and Awe == | ||
[[wikipedia:Awe|Awe]] is related to the [[emotional]] experienced of wonder, but with an implied sense of reverence versus the [[joy]] of wonder. | |||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QyVZrV3d3o||center|Jason Silva: Shots of Awe|frame}} | [[wikipedia:Inspiration|Inspiration]] is what turns Wonder and Awe into creative action. When speaking on [[spiritual]] matters we feel inspiration because the [[god concept]] motivates us towards [[self-improvement]] and the improvement of [[society]]. We see the Wonder of the [[universe]] and are inspired to make it even more Wonderful. | ||
== Cultivating Wonder Without Woo == | |||
[[Traditional]] [[religion]] has leaned hard into the "mysteriousness" of the [[universe]] as a central method for connecting with awe. Because the [[universe]] is so huge, complex, and incomprehensible to us, there must be some "[[god]]" being that is way smarter than we are that actually can comprehend it. While this makes total sense in a pre-[[science]] era where real understanding is impossible, it no longer seems intellectually honest now that this [[information]] is readily available to anyone. | |||
[[File:Keats-unweaving-the-rainbow-quote-lamia.png|thumb|Well said, but advocates ignorance. While we may never go back to the way things were before we understood the universe, that is a good thing.]] | |||
Creating wonder through mystery also opens up [[spiritual]] practice to [[woo]], [[Conspiracy theories|conspiracies]], and [[grifters]]. If so much of how the [[universe]] works is a mystery, then the [[mind]] becomes open to anyone who provides an explanation. The [[brain]] naturally seeks explanations and resists the idea that mysteries cannot be solved. The best solution is to provide a [[rational]] explanation before an irrational one can be presented. | |||
But does taking the mystery out of the [[universe]] take away the wonder? Absolutely not. There is far more wonder, awe, and inspiration in understanding exactly how something works than the mystery can ever possibly hold. There is far more [[happiness]], too, since actually figuring out how things work is the [[Brains|brain's]] primary function and [[happiness]] is the by-product! | |||
When you see how intricately all of the pieces of the [[universe]] fit and work together, from the [[Quantum mechanics|quantum]] level all the way to [[fractal]] galactic clusters, and the infinite detail that every tiny piece of the [[universe]] contains which could be studied for a [[Longevity|lifetime]], how can you possibly say that the wonder is gone? It is a ridiculous, self-serving notion meant to trap people in ignorance, not grant them access to [[spiritual]] ecstasy. | |||
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=St-GCiRqUmQ Cultivating Wonder - To the Best of Our Knowledge] | |||
== Awesome Videos == | |||
Is it hyperbolic to use the word "awesome" when you really just mean "pretty darn cool"? Probably. It might be better to reserve the use of some words to describe truly unique encounters with the divine. But that is a digression.{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QyVZrV3d3o||center|Jason Silva: Shots of Awe|frame}} | |||
<br> | <br> | ||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrGpipgcfi4||center|The Trick to Regaining Your Childlike Wonder - Zach King|frame}} | {{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrGpipgcfi4||center|The Trick to Regaining Your Childlike Wonder - Zach King|frame}} | ||
<br> | <br> | ||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysAJQycTw-0||center|Dacher Keltner: Why Awe Is Such an Important Emotion|frame}} | {{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysAJQycTw-0||center|Dacher Keltner: Why Awe Is Such an Important Emotion|frame}} | ||
<br> | |||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvXC8I4Gms4&list=PLghTC0dNWdH3XymFQkgewKyRjWp8Qmt0I||center|Philomena Cunk's Moments of Wonder (Series)|frame}} | |||
== Things I Didn't Know I Loved == | |||
[https://poets.org/poem/things-i-didnt-know-i-loved Things I Didn't Know I Loved] is a beautiful poem by Turkish poet [[wikipedia:Nâzım_Hikmet|Nâzim Hikmet]] that explores the wonders of [[life]], [[love]], and [[nature]] as contemplated through the window of a train.<blockquote>it’s 1962 March 28th | |||
I’m sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train | |||
night is falling | |||
I never knew I liked | |||
night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain | |||
I don’t like | |||
comparing nightfall to a tired bird | |||
I didn’t know I loved the earth | |||
can someone who hasn’t worked the earth love it | |||
I’ve never worked the earth | |||
it must be my only Platonic love | |||
and here I’ve loved rivers all this time | |||
whether motionless like this they curl skirting the hills | |||
European hills crowned with chateaus | |||
or whether stretched out flat as far as the eye can see | |||
I know you can’t wash in the same river even once | |||
I know the river will bring new lights you'll never see | |||
I know we live slightly longer than a horse but not nearly as long as a crow | |||
I know this has troubled people before | |||
and will trouble those after me | |||
I know all this has been said a thousand times before | |||
and will be said after me | |||
I didn’t know I loved the sky | |||
cloudy or clear | |||
the blue vault Andrei studied on his back at Borodino | |||
in prison I translated both volumes of ''War and Peace'' into Turkish | |||
I hear voices | |||
not from the blue vault but from the yard | |||
the guards are beating someone again | |||
I didn’t know I loved trees | |||
bare beeches near Moscow in Peredelkino | |||
they come upon me in winter noble and modest | |||
beeches are Russian the way poplars are Turkish | |||
“the poplars of Izmir | |||
losing their leaves. . . | |||
they call me The Knife. . . | |||
lover like a young tree. . . | |||
I blow stately mansions sky-high” | |||
in the Ilgaz woods in 1920 I tied an embroidered linen handkerchief | |||
to a pine bough for luck | |||
I never knew I loved roads | |||
even the asphalt kind | |||
Vera's behind the wheel we're driving from Moscow to the Crimea | |||
Koktebele | |||
formerly “Goktepé ili” in Turkish | |||
the two of us inside a closed box | |||
the world flows past on both sides distant and mute | |||
I was never so close to anyone in my life | |||
bandits stopped me on the red road between Bolu and Geredé | |||
when I was eighteen | |||
apart from my life I didn’t have anything in the wagon they could take | |||
and at eighteen our lives are what we value least | |||
I’ve written this somewhere before | |||
wading through a dark muddy street I'm going to the shadow play | |||
Ramazan night | |||
a paper lantern leading the way | |||
maybe nothing like this ever happened | |||
maybe I read it somewhere an eight-year-old boy | |||
going to the shadow play | |||
Ramazan night in Istanbul holding his grandfather’s hand | |||
his grandfather has on a fez and is wearing the fur coat | |||
with a sable collar over his robe | |||
and there’s a lantern in the servant’s hand | |||
and I can’t contain myself for joy | |||
flowers come to mind for some reason | |||
poppies cactuses jonquils | |||
in the jonquil garden in Kadikoy Istanbul I kissed Marika | |||
fresh almonds on her breath | |||
I was seventeen | |||
my heart on a swing touched the sky | |||
I didn’t know I loved flowers | |||
friends sent me three red carnations in prison | |||
I just remembered the stars | |||
I love them too | |||
whether I’m floored watching them from below | |||
or whether I'm flying at their side | |||
I have some questions for the cosmonauts | |||
were the stars much bigger | |||
did they look like huge jewels on black velvet | |||
or apricots on orange | |||
did you feel proud to get closer to the stars | |||
I saw color photos of the cosmos in ''Ogonek'' magazine now don’t | |||
be upset comrades but nonfigurative shall we say or abstract | |||
well some of them looked just like such paintings which is to | |||
say they were terribly figurative and concrete | |||
my heart was in my mouth looking at them | |||
they are our endless desire to grasp things | |||
seeing them I could even think of death and not feel at all sad | |||
I never knew I loved the cosmos | |||
snow flashes in front of my eyes | |||
both heavy wet steady snow and the dry whirling kind | |||
I didn’t know I liked snow | |||
I never knew I loved the sun | |||
even when setting cherry-red as now | |||
in Istanbul too it sometimes sets in postcard colors | |||
but you aren’t about to paint it that way | |||
I didn’t know I loved the sea | |||
except the Sea of Azov | |||
or how much | |||
I didn’t know I loved clouds | |||
whether I’m under or up above them | |||
whether they look like giants or shaggy white beasts | |||
moonlight the falsest the most languid the most petit-bourgeois | |||
strikes me | |||
I like it | |||
I didn’t know I liked rain | |||
whether it falls like a fine net or splatters against the glass my | |||
heart leaves me tangled up in a net or trapped inside a drop | |||
and takes off for uncharted countries I didn’t know I loved | |||
rain but why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting | |||
by the window on the Prague-Berlin train | |||
is it because I lit my sixth cigarette | |||
one alone could kill me | |||
is it because I’m half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow | |||
her hair straw-blond eyelashes blue | |||
the train plunges on through the pitch-black night | |||
I never knew I liked the night pitch-black | |||
sparks fly from the engine | |||
I didn’t know I loved sparks | |||
I didn’t know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty | |||
to find it out sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train | |||
watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return | |||
''19 April 1962'' | |||
'' Moscow''</blockquote> | |||
== Wonderful Music == | |||
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PobrSpMwKk4 ''It's like a jungle sometimes. It makes me wonder how I keep from goin' under.''] | |||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBrd_3VMC3c||center|Louis Armstrong - What a Wonderful World|frame}} | |||
<br> | <br> | ||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zpYFAzhAZY||center|Natalie Merchant - Wonder|frame}} | {{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zpYFAzhAZY||center|Natalie Merchant - Wonder|frame}} | ||
<br> | |||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHeQemJJQII||center|Wonder - Shawn Mendes|frame}} | {{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHeQemJJQII||center|Wonder - Shawn Mendes|frame}} | ||
<br> | |||
{{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hzrDeceEKc||center|Oasis - Wonderwall|frame}} | {{#ev:youtube|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hzrDeceEKc||center|Oasis - Wonderwall|frame}} |
Latest revision as of 11:30, 10 February 2025

Wonder refers to the sense of beauty and awe that you get when interacting with the cool parts of the universe.
"Wonder is the feeling of the philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder." -Plato
Experiencing wonder and associating it with the god concept helps you develop a universal sense of optimism and automatic mindfulness.
Inspiration and Awe
Awe is related to the emotional experienced of wonder, but with an implied sense of reverence versus the joy of wonder.
Inspiration is what turns Wonder and Awe into creative action. When speaking on spiritual matters we feel inspiration because the god concept motivates us towards self-improvement and the improvement of society. We see the Wonder of the universe and are inspired to make it even more Wonderful.
Cultivating Wonder Without Woo
Traditional religion has leaned hard into the "mysteriousness" of the universe as a central method for connecting with awe. Because the universe is so huge, complex, and incomprehensible to us, there must be some "god" being that is way smarter than we are that actually can comprehend it. While this makes total sense in a pre-science era where real understanding is impossible, it no longer seems intellectually honest now that this information is readily available to anyone.

Creating wonder through mystery also opens up spiritual practice to woo, conspiracies, and grifters. If so much of how the universe works is a mystery, then the mind becomes open to anyone who provides an explanation. The brain naturally seeks explanations and resists the idea that mysteries cannot be solved. The best solution is to provide a rational explanation before an irrational one can be presented.
But does taking the mystery out of the universe take away the wonder? Absolutely not. There is far more wonder, awe, and inspiration in understanding exactly how something works than the mystery can ever possibly hold. There is far more happiness, too, since actually figuring out how things work is the brain's primary function and happiness is the by-product!
When you see how intricately all of the pieces of the universe fit and work together, from the quantum level all the way to fractal galactic clusters, and the infinite detail that every tiny piece of the universe contains which could be studied for a lifetime, how can you possibly say that the wonder is gone? It is a ridiculous, self-serving notion meant to trap people in ignorance, not grant them access to spiritual ecstasy.
Cultivating Wonder - To the Best of Our Knowledge
Awesome Videos
Is it hyperbolic to use the word "awesome" when you really just mean "pretty darn cool"? Probably. It might be better to reserve the use of some words to describe truly unique encounters with the divine. But that is a digression.
Things I Didn't Know I Loved
Things I Didn't Know I Loved is a beautiful poem by Turkish poet Nâzim Hikmet that explores the wonders of life, love, and nature as contemplated through the window of a train.
it’s 1962 March 28th
I’m sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
night is falling
I never knew I liked
night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain
I don’t like
comparing nightfall to a tired bird
I didn’t know I loved the earthcan someone who hasn’t worked the earth love it
I’ve never worked the earth
it must be my only Platonic love
and here I’ve loved rivers all this timewhether motionless like this they curl skirting the hills
European hills crowned with chateaus
or whether stretched out flat as far as the eye can see
I know you can’t wash in the same river even once
I know the river will bring new lights you'll never see
I know we live slightly longer than a horse but not nearly as long as a crow
I know this has troubled people before
and will trouble those after me
I know all this has been said a thousand times beforeand will be said after me
I didn’t know I loved the sky
cloudy or clear
the blue vault Andrei studied on his back at Borodino
in prison I translated both volumes of War and Peace into Turkish
I hear voices
not from the blue vault but from the yard
the guards are beating someone again
I didn’t know I loved trees
bare beeches near Moscow in Peredelkino
they come upon me in winter noble and modest
beeches are Russian the way poplars are Turkish
“the poplars of Izmir
losing their leaves. . .
they call me The Knife. . .
lover like a young tree. . .
I blow stately mansions sky-high”
in the Ilgaz woods in 1920 I tied an embroidered linen handkerchief
to a pine bough for luck
I never knew I loved roadseven the asphalt kind
Vera's behind the wheel we're driving from Moscow to the Crimea
Koktebele
formerly “Goktepé ili” in Turkish
the two of us inside a closed box
the world flows past on both sides distant and mute
I was never so close to anyone in my life
bandits stopped me on the red road between Bolu and Geredé
when I was eighteen
apart from my life I didn’t have anything in the wagon they could take
and at eighteen our lives are what we value least
I’ve written this somewhere before
wading through a dark muddy street I'm going to the shadow play
Ramazan night
a paper lantern leading the way
maybe nothing like this ever happened
maybe I read it somewhere an eight-year-old boy
going to the shadow play
Ramazan night in Istanbul holding his grandfather’s hand
his grandfather has on a fez and is wearing the fur coat
with a sable collar over his robe
and there’s a lantern in the servant’s hand
and I can’t contain myself for joy
flowers come to mind for some reason
poppies cactuses jonquils
in the jonquil garden in Kadikoy Istanbul I kissed Marika
fresh almonds on her breath
I was seventeen
my heart on a swing touched the sky
I didn’t know I loved flowers
friends sent me three red carnations in prison
I just remembered the starsI love them too
whether I’m floored watching them from below
or whether I'm flying at their side
I have some questions for the cosmonautswere the stars much bigger
did they look like huge jewels on black velvet
or apricots on orange
did you feel proud to get closer to the stars
I saw color photos of the cosmos in Ogonek magazine now don’t
be upset comrades but nonfigurative shall we say or abstract
well some of them looked just like such paintings which is to
say they were terribly figurative and concrete
my heart was in my mouth looking at them
they are our endless desire to grasp things
seeing them I could even think of death and not feel at all sad
I never knew I loved the cosmos
snow flashes in front of my eyesboth heavy wet steady snow and the dry whirling kind
I didn’t know I liked snow
I never knew I loved the sun
even when setting cherry-red as now
in Istanbul too it sometimes sets in postcard colors
but you aren’t about to paint it that way
I didn’t know I loved the sea
except the Sea of Azov
or how much
I didn’t know I loved cloudswhether I’m under or up above them
whether they look like giants or shaggy white beasts
moonlight the falsest the most languid the most petit-bourgeois
strikes me
I like it
I didn’t know I liked rainwhether it falls like a fine net or splatters against the glass my
heart leaves me tangled up in a net or trapped inside a drop
and takes off for uncharted countries I didn’t know I loved
rain but why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting
by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
is it because I lit my sixth cigarette
one alone could kill me
is it because I’m half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow
her hair straw-blond eyelashes blue
the train plunges on through the pitch-black nightI never knew I liked the night pitch-black
sparks fly from the engine
I didn’t know I loved sparks
I didn’t know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty
to find it out sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return
19 April 1962Moscow
Wonderful Music
It's like a jungle sometimes. It makes me wonder how I keep from goin' under.