WHAT IS USUALLY CALLED “wisdom” is passed on generation after generation within a family because of the beneficial effect it has had over the years. However, what many of us call wisdom is really insight. Insight is a source of wisdom when it does not come from fear.
Learn not to be afraid of life and not to listen to the negative insights that come from a fear of life and not the experience of it. I love what Mark Twain said about experience: “We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it — and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on the hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again — and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.”
So learn from the insights you obtain and those of the wise who have preceded you, so as not to live like the cat that Twain talks about. If you have been raised by a mother cat that didn’t teach you this, then go out and learn the truth for yourself.
Excerpted with permission from 365 Prescriptions for the Soul: Daily Words for Healing Body, Mind & Spirit © 2010 Dr. Bernie Siegel. Printed with permission of New World Library, Novato, CA. www.newworldlibrary.com or 800-972-6657 ext. 52.