Example Paragraph for Personal Response:
“Wisest is she who knows she does not know” is a statement Socrates would agree with fully.
He regularly admitted his own ignorance, believing that wisdom is earned through discussion and
challenging established thought and custom. Yet, what is wisdom? Wisdom has to go beyond learning
and education. It might not be considered wise to acquire advanced degree after advanced degree,
continually striving for, what? Socrates might counter that education is a form of established ideas
because what happens in education but reading about people and interacting with people who profess
to have the answers? Therefore, true wisdom has to be something more. Then again, would it be wise
to stay away from education altogether? That too does not seem a path that would lead to an enriched
philosophical life. Does the man living under the bridge have more wisdom than I do simply because I
have a degree and live in a nice, warm house? Obviously not, but wisdom may not be based on life
choices. So, if wisdom isn’t based on knowledge or on life choices but includes them, it must be a type
of viewpoint. Perhaps it can be grounded in many human experiences, but permeates them and any
other encounters a person may have. Wisdom involves HOW a person interacts with and views her
world. Wisdom is a deep understanding and acceptance of humanity in all its glories and faults. For me,
I have not encountered any truly wise people. I have friends who I admire and have aspects of wisdom,
but a fully wise person eludes me. On the other hand, I see wisdom in people older than me about
human experiences because they have experienced them, integrated them, learned from them. In the
same way, I see myself with a calmer and more secure perspective than some young people I come
across who may be rattled by the rawness of human life. For example, the other day I was conversing
with a young person who recently began to drive and had knocked over a mailbox. He was pretty upset
and wanted to pretend it didn’t happen. I counseled him to fix it! Let go of his ego that he is not a good
driver because he wasn’t looking when he backed up and make it better by accepting his fault and
making amends. Then look behind when backing up! It may be a tired cliché, but a bit of wisdom might
come from “been there, done that” but improved with LEARNED from that and now live the lesson of
that.