I read this quote, "Contemplation is a dying art," in some random college brochure two years ago. It was the only valuable piece of information in the whole packet. And the though stunned me for some strange reason, and I didn't quite understand what it mean. But, after spending a lot of time writing poems, stories, articles, etc. I have finally been able to understand the statement.

We, as a society, no longer think. We don't express ourselves or share different opinions or ideas. We have allowed our voices to be silenced and we just take whatever is thrown at us, regardless of how we feel or think. I would say this has to do with just a natural evolution of how we treat one another. I like to think, I like reading things that make me think. I like looking over something and feeling confused and having to reread it again and again because it makes me think differently. We need to contemplate things more; set aside time for us to get lost in our own thoughts again. It's amazing what we could come up with. Below is something I wrote about a year ago, and even I still have to contemplate what I mean:

When a wonderer wonders, one wonders what the wonderer is wondering about. This in turn makes the other person a wonderer wondering about the wonders of the other wonderer.

If a teacher is teaching, then gets taught something by someone else, are they still the teacher, or are they only being taught by a new teacher teaching things that the teacher didn't know, making him a student?

Now here's the real question. If a wonderer is wondering while a teacher is teaching, is the wonderer learning? Cause if the wonderer is wondering while the teacher is teaching, he's learning about himself, but not being taught. And if the teacher starts to wonder about what the wonderer is wondering, is he still a teacher, or is he now a wonderer too? And if the wonderer then tells the teacher what he was wondering, and the teacher learns something from the wonderer, is the wonderer now the teacher? And is the teacher now a student?

Now, I hope this makes your head hurt a little. I hope you have to read it more than once. I hope that your creative and individual lines of thinking kick into gear. We all have the part of us that needs to contemplate. Stop asking how, what, who, or when. Ask the question of why. Why? Ask why, and the answers are infinite.