Cogito Ergo Sum?

Did you ever do something growing up that still makes you cringe?
I did. Going into Grade 10 I made a fateful and short-sighted decision: I chose Latin over French. Short-sighted because Latin did not turn out to be one of Canada’s official languages!

What is the meaning of “Cogito, ergo sum”? “I think, therefore I am.”
It’s a profound statement, but not in the hands of adolescents in the locker room, where it became “I stink, therefore I am”… or later, when Monty Python converted it to “I’m pink, therefore I’m spam”!

“I think, therefore I am” was coined by Rene Descartes, who is often called the father of modern philosophy. Descartes realized that having consciousness is what sets us apart. Thinking is the necessary condition for our existence as human beings – it distinguishes us from the animals.

What I want you to consider is whether thinking is sufficient for existence – in other words – “I think, therefore I am, but is thinking enough to make me a complete human being?

Albert Einstein is widely regarded as the greatest man of the 20th century. Here’s what the great physicist Einstein said: “We should take care not to make the intellect our god. It has, of course, powerful muscles – but no personality.”
If I had appreciated this, I might have taken French in high school and been a better Canadian -- instead of trying to get higher marks.

What do you and I rely on before we take action?
We use our Heads, which start with data and use logic or analysis to reach conclusions.
Then there’s the Heart, which relies on feelings and emotions.
And lastly we have the Gut, or Intuition, which helps us makes decisions in a flash.

Our mind is our very very personal computer. It is bombarded by thousands of thoughts daily and it responds according to its learned routines – it just can’t do other things very well because it is does not contain our personal values. Let me tell you a story…

One night a wife found her husband standing over their baby's crib. Silently she watched him. As he looked down at the sleeping child, she saw on his face a mixture of emotions: delight tempered by disbelief, and enchantment mixed with curiosity. Touched by all this, with eyes glistening she slipped her arm around her husband. "A penny for your thoughts," she said.
"It's amazing!" he replied enthusiastically. "I just can't see how anybody can make a crib like that for only $69.95."

Did you ever wonder why the smartest people in school, the ones with the highest IQ’s, often are not the most successful people in later life? The reason is that they lack Emotional Intelligence, EQ, which means --– common sense, understanding your own emotions and those of others, and regulating your behaviour in the light of that understanding. The good news is that you can learn emotional intelligence. I did.

We used to have a federal Cabinet Minister whose name was Don Mazankowski. He would introduce himself to people by saying: “Hi. My name is Don Mazankowski. That’s spelled D-o-n.”
Another political reference that we have all come to understand: how can people lead a country successfully if they lack compassion for their constituents?

Now let’s consider intuition, gut reactions. Do you remember all that talk early on in the Obama/Clinton primary about the 3 a.m. phone call and who would be able to make the right decision – without data, in the moment? If you consider all the decisions that you make in a day, it will amaze you how great a proportion are made intuitively. That is a great practical experiment to do in the next 24 hours!

400 years after Descartes led the way, it is clear that our understanding of the complete human being has evolved dramatically.

We think, we feel, we are intuitive…therefore we are.