Reasoning with oneself.. Reflective thinking? Does it help? 

In your esteemed life and various interactions, perhaps you have met people who complain about others and especially that those ‘others’ do not ‘think’.

Often and of course, such complaints emerge from complainants who may disagree with the ‘accused others’ in principles, thoughts or arguments.

Such complaints also often result from differences in opinions or outlook in life and often the ‘he or she doesn’t think’ claims form the foundation or even fuel/basis for negative talk, gossip or slander eventually leading to disrespect and hatred.. .

Yet, in genuine situations where the reasoning capacity of ‘those who don’t think’ may evidently show relative to the average judgements of relatively many people and wide observations, the recourse should be in gently and respectfully observing the anomaly and opting to help those whom we may feel ‘do not think’ or even ‘reason’ at our level instead of merely dismissing them or showing them disdain and disrespect…

As human beings, we are naturally wired for subjectivity and most of us are often delighted when others agree fully or even partially with our points of view or arguments.

Many of us also have natural or acquired biases or prejudices which make us dismiss others without even trying to listen to the ‘others’ views or opinions.

Some of us are also quite arrogant and we tend to judge other people by physical appearances including the attire, skin colour, mental & physical disability or even spiritual beliefs & inclinations, and consequently we tend to dismiss or prejudge such people even without paying much attention to their thoughts or opinions.

Through our biases and actions, often condescending, we hurt the ‘others who don’t think’, dismiss them and even avoid these ‘others’ and in the process we breed animosity or hatred and make Society less cohesive.

In our myopic behavior we also miss the vital lessons the ‘others’ might be bearing in their thoughts and views and most of all we miss the rich interpersonal experiences that often result from being human and humane and from socialization.

Yet, if we could often or daily pose and honestly and keenly self interrogate our thoughts & actions and then reason with our own selves, we could realize our mistakes and endeavour to change and also learn how to become and remain better human beings in terms of how we control our thoughts and emotions.

Self reasoning with our own selves, especially in our own privacy, relaxation and normalcy devoid of emotions such as fear, hatred or daily stresses can help us to reflect and eventually realize our human mistakes and weaknesses.

If we remain really honest with ourselves, we learn that we erred and hurt others and if we are courageous and honest enough too, we can then or later gather more guts/courage to approach the ‘erstwhile people who don’t think or fools’ (as our prejudices may have led us to believe and prejudge) and then offer them (‘the people who don’t think’) an olive branch of peace and reconciliation.

Of course, the ‘olive branch’ measures require the courage to admit our past errors in prejudices and condescending attitude and making physical one-on-one apologies.

… And progressively, the ‘olive branch’ route makes for better future interpersonal relations and a better, cohesive, friendly human environment and Society