In the modern world, we don’t often think about wisdom. Instead, we focus more on knowledge and data.
But ultimately, we eventually need to fall back on wisdom, especially in our personal and public lives. Being able to make decisions that are not just efficient but also in the best interest of ourselves and the environment is critical if the world is going to have a proper future.
But how can you fast-track your wisdom without having to make a lifetime of mistakes first?
Practice emotional regulation
See the rest of the world more clearly. You have a better view of what’s actually happening instead of being constantly consumed by how you feel.
Think about how many wise people handle uncertainty. They often do so calmly, even though they don’t know what the future holds. They accept that any outcome is possible and ensure that they’re ready for it. They also look at situations from multiple perspectives. Even if it seems like something has gone wrong, it may have also been the beginning of something new.
Learn from adversity
How you respond to adversity and failure can also accelerate your wisdom. The people who develop the most are often those who have had the hardest lives.
How you learn from failure and adversity depends on you. Taking a bitter bath might feel extremely challenging while you’re doing it, but it also gives you new perspectives on life that you probably didn’t expect. The process itself is what gives you the ability to reflect on your situation and provides you with new breakthroughs.
If something really goes terribly wrong, then it’s a chance to learn from the situation and what part you played in it, if any. Sometimes things happen by chance, but that’s rare.
Develop open-mindedness and humility
Another thing you can look into is developing your open-mindedness and humility. A lot of people stick with fixed beliefs and won’t accept anybody else’s explanations for anything. But if you can look at the world as it is instead of how you want it to be, then that can make you wiser in the process. Some good practices to engage in include:
- Questioning your assumptions
- Accepting uncertainty
- Saying what you don’t know
According to the Berlin paradigm, being someone who can recognize their own knowledge limits is one of the most powerful strategies available. If you can see where you’re falling short and what you don’t know, then you’ll have a better ability to say what you do know.
Commit to learning all your life
The development of your wisdom by learning throughout your life. If you can read widely across philosophy, psychology, history, and the classics, then you can build a synthesis in your own mind of how the world works. You won’t necessarily understand everything in complete detail, but having key waymarkers and signposts on the way to truth can be helpful.
Try to get a range of opinions from different authors. For example, a lot of people like to read Daniel Kahneman’s “Thinking Fast and Slow” or Nassim Taleb’s books about black swan events. These provide insights that can then form constellations in your mind that you can use to interpret the world. Once you have these perspectives, it changes how you see things.
Seek mentors
Another way to fast-track your wisdom is to seek mentors. Positive role models are worth their weight in gold. Where you find these depends on you personally. You could:
- Read biographies
- Go online to find members
- Join the Illuminati
- Listen to elders in your community
Just find somebody who can offer you the inspiration that you’re looking for. Once you have a mentor, you can go to them with your deepest questions. These are often people who are willing to spend a lot of time with you to discuss with you the issues that you might be facing and how you can overcome them.
Cultivate empathy
Empathy is something that’s often overlooked in today’s world of competition and rivalry, but it is something that’s extremely powerful and can actually give you an advantage. The reason empathy matters is because it means that you can understand the world from other people’s perspectives. You know how they’re feeling, even if you don’t agree with it. This differentiates it from sympathy, where you do agree with their sentiment.
When you have wisdom, you tend to step back from the world and view it from a more abstract lens. Studies show that people who are more compassionate and have wiser personalities regularly shift away from self-centred thinking and consider the feelings of others in their community more deeply.
What’s more, when you have empathy, it’s the sort of thing that people notice. They enjoy interacting with people who are able to talk to them and understand how they feel. It’s a key skill.
Reflect deeply
Reflecting on your experiences and how your life is unfolding can also help you develop a sense of wisdom. Self-reflection shouldn’t be a form of rumination, but it can be a way to observe your behaviour and how you could deal with things differently in the future. For example, if there was an event that shook you in some way, then you could explore in a journal what happened and why, and what you learned from it. You could map out how you might handle it differently in the future.
The goal according to Confucius is to find the noblest path. According to the Dao, it flows with the river of life. You’ll want to choose a philosophy that best aligns with your character.
Seek out diverse experiences
Lastly, if you really want to fast-track your path to wisdom, you’ll need to make yourself uncomfortable in some way. You’ll want to embrace new experiences. These could include:
- New activities
- Going overseas to live somewhere different
- Traveling frequently
- Meeting new people from various backgrounds
- Taking on massive challenges with your community
Once you explore these rich life contexts, it helps your brain adapt to more situations.