In the world of knowledge, everyday something new is added. In pursuit of the way, everyday something is let go. - Lao Tzu
From any remote spot one can access information electronically: the library, computer, interactive exchanges about math, the latest news from anywhere in the world is at hand. But this is not the same as wisdom.
We have answering machines, fax machines, and email. But people seem to be not so much communicating as dumping. As long as they have sent a message, they feel absolved of all responsibilities with a minimum of inconvenience, social contact, or feed back.
The ancients had a very different attitude toward knowledge and wisdom. Many of them were swordsmen and, as they word 'shi' implies, they had to truly know the sword before they were ready to stake life and death on it. The ancients taught that one did not truly know something until that knowledge was part of one's very own soul. So before they ever ventured out with a sword, the swordsmen trained to put skill into the fiber of their muscles. Then they trained further, until their skill became part of their reflexes. Then they trained even more, until their skill became intrinsic to their minds. Then they emptied their minds, so that their skill was part of their spirit. Only then would they say that they knew enough to go to battle.
What is knowing today? True, we have an unprecedented amount of information available on an unprecedented sacle. But the resolutions to the true questions of life come not thorugh mere communications and thinking, no matter how quick or vast. The come from knowing and converting knowledge into wisdom. And knowing comes only when we have made the answers part of ourselves.
