Being alive means continually adapting to endless stimuli. Through the filters of our physical senses the information we are capable of detecting as humans is a microscopic sliver in comparison to the entire frequency spectrum. This tiny sliver is further restricted by crystallized neural pathways developed through childhood and adulthood in order for us to be able to "skip steps" in recognizing what is in front of us. We only function at all because we make endless assumptions about reality; we become adept at filling in the gaps of what we perceive.

The design of the human body is ingenious, but functions well only within specific parameters. The nervous system is designed to transmit a certain amplitude of electrical current — turn up the mind's voltage a bit too much, and you burn out the body's circuits entirely. Infants cry partly because perceiving the world even with our already muted senses is overwhelming to the point one cannot remain silent — especially when the undeveloped brain experiences different sensations all wrapped up together, synaesthetically, until the aforementioned crystallized neural pathways are paved to keep things healthily separate.

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Ignorance is an important part of human nature; without ignorance you have no capacity to learn anything. Ignorance is the fallow field in which knowledge's seeds are sewn, awaiting the activating warmth of consciousness' ray directed upon it. Through understanding the severity of our intellect's limitations, we attain humility and a sense of wonder for the underlying wholeness we dimly intuit must be prior to the emergence of divisions and parts. Yet what caused that causeless cause? The intellect only answers its questions with more questions, but through its questing after truth, it grows hale and vigorous. We begin to desire to live for living's sake and drop agendas as they arise.

It is no large wonder, given the tiresomeness of constant stimuli, that many paths of self-development recommend the cultivation of nonreactivity to the world. Becoming less reactive is nourishing for oneself both mentally and emotionally, because there is less "noise" to distract from pursuing deeply held purposes — and anchoring for others, because they find through you a quiet refuge from the storm of humanity's swirling mob. Through you, they discover it is also possible for them to remain calm despite whatever appears to be occurring. Thus, wise souls help keep war from totally overwhelming and self-destructing humanity through the ages by embodying peace and offering themselves as a gift towards the potential attainment of this truth by the mass.

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To remain relatively content — unharried by vicissitude — also requires, paradoxically, a keen awareness of all that is occurring and an ability to be endlessly flexible. It may seem to be a paradox that to be less reactive one must be highly attuned to events unfolding, yet to be peaceful doesn't mean to be cold, unfeeling and unaware. Apathy is incompatible with the great compassion required to be truly at peace.