“The only sane policy for the world is that of abolishing war.” -Linus Pauling
Few months ago I was in a conference with one renowned research professor.
We were walking and talking simultaneously to go from one building to another building.
It was a little bit a cold day, about half a mile of walking to go from one building to another, so he decided to drive. Once we reached the parking lot, I saw a dollar 10 bill laying on the ground. I told him that there is a dollar 10 bill laying on the ground.
Without any second thought, he replied, “if it was a dollar 10 bill somebody else would have already picked it up.”
I was behind him so I slowed down, I ignored what he just said, stepped back, picked up a dollar 10 bill and put it into my pocket.
We got in the car and reached our destination, another building.
We separated immediately after we got in the building.
I had to stay on the ground floor and he had to go to the 3rd floor.
I greeted him saying ‘bye’ as he went towards the elevator.
I had to use the restroom so when I was in the restroom, I took out that dollar 10 bill and looked very carefully on both sides.
I asked myself, “is it a real bill?”
It was a real dollar 10 bill.
At that moment, I realized whoever the person is, famous or successful or with a couple of PhD, MD or MBA after the name, everybody lives with certain limitations.
This renowned professor has produced many theories from his lab, he has published some influential peer reviewed journal articles, but I realized, each one of his theories and publications might have some sort of limitations.
I’m absolutely not judging him, he is phenomenal, a great human being and a great scientist.
I really admire him as a great mind, a creative research scholar, and, of course, he has contributed a lot for the scientific community.
He inspires us everyday, no doubt about it.
What I’m saying is, we all have self awareness inside us, at some point in life it matures and helps to shape our lives.
But the only thing is we have to work to grow our self awareness.
There is a rarity in richness in both intellect and emotions
One of the things Patrick King, a social interaction specialist and author of “The Art of Self-Awareness” teaches a lot is that self-awareness is not just a journey about ourselves, it involves the people around us. His words, “Self awareness is social awareness. Know thyself and your relationships will benefit tenfold.”
Every human being is relative in this world so that we can’t just trust and follow someone blindly.
The amazing thing is that we become more self aware when we self indulge in the activities of our second choice which is, sometimes, little far from one’s expertise.
Self-indulgence, especially little far from one’s core expertise, shines our intuition and explores our inner awareness and character in very different ways.
One of my heroes in my life is Linus Pauling.
After reading his childhood, schooling, and what he achieved, I was wondering how one person could be that much of significance and inspiration for all of us.
One thing that intrigued me is that Linus Pauling used to mop the floors when he was in school.
He worked in a grocery store to survive, he also worked as an apprentice machinist.
That reminds us how humble his beginning was.
Linus Pauling wrote a book “How to Live Longer and Feel Better” when he was about 85 years old. In the book, he explains about natural health information on various vitamins and minerals for our body.
He said “Every ailment, every sickness and every disease can be traced back to an organic trace mineral deficiency. Provided one has the correct level of vitamin, mineral and nutritional input, the body can overcome disease.”
Up to now in my life, I’ve worked and experienced some special people, who are richer intellectually, but many are bankrupt in emotions.
I’ve also seen and worked with some jerks with MD, PhD, and MBA after their name. I’m sure they are less likely to be remembered as a good human being in the future even if they accomplish something intellectually.
My point is, humanity comes before intellect.
I’ve also seen, worked, and experienced quite a few richer people in emotions but bankrupt in intellect.
To be honest, I’ve seen, worked, and experienced majority people who are moderate in both faculties of emotion and intellect, in general they are good, ordinary, and common everyday people.
But I’ve rarely seen and experienced richness in both intellect and emotions.
Linus Pauling falls in this category, at least, for me from reading and thinking about his contributions.
As a result of his unique personality, he received the highest recognition on earth, the Nobel prize in both faculties.
He got the Nobel prize in chemistry in 1954, one of the pinnacle of intellectual richness.
He also got the Nobel prize in peace in 1962, one of the pinnacle of emotional richness.
He became a peace activist and a vocal proponent against any kind of warfare in the world.
He is one of four people to have won more than one Nobel Prize, only a person to get it unshared in two distinctly different areas.
The question that came in my mind is how did he become such a towering figure in intellect as well as in emotions. There is a transition in life between intellect and emotion, only very few can realize it.
Compensate the lack of intellect with more emotion, peace, and awareness
Pema Chodron, an American Buddhist nun and author of “When Things Fall Apart” said “Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all. Life is a good teacher and a good friend. Things are always in transition, if we could only realize it.”
When Linus Pauling was 9 years old, he read the Bible and Darwin’s Origin of species.
He got lost in the wonder of nature by studying many things that interested him like the study of insects and the study of minerals.
He had a habit of self indulgence whatever he liked.
When he was 14 years old, the fascination of chemistry engulfed him completely.
He said, “I was simply entranced by chemical phenomena, by the reactions in which substances, often with strikingly different properties, appear; and I hoped to learn more and more about this aspect of the world.”
He was intrigued by the mystery of chemistry and devoted his life to Chemistry.
At least, nobody thought that Linus Pauling was a child prodigy.
He became what he was by his habit of self indulgence on things that interests him.
Around his habit of self-indulgence, he built the skill of self-awareness.
Once he said, “I made use of the college library by borrowing books other than scientific books, such as all of the plays by George Bernard Shaw, the writing of Edgar Allan Poe. The college library helped me to develop a broader aspect of life.”
Many of us have no idea that self-awareness is also a skill that we can develop by reading George Bernard Shaw and Edgar Allan Poe.
Aristotle, the great philosopher, said some 24 hundred years ago “Excellence and lasting happiness depend on our ability to find out our intermediate position that is equal from each of the extremes.” Intermediate position is finding stumbles and limitations.
David Brooks, leading writer and author of “The Road to Character” says that it is okay to be flawed, since we all are. Sin and limitations are woven through our lives. We are all stumblers, and the beauty is in the stumbling, the beauty is in recognizing our stumbling and trying to be more graceful as we grow older.
When we think of physical pleasure like sex, sweets, alcohol, smoking; great people always suggest that we should take middle ground between overindulgence and abstinence.
In reality, indulgence is a lot different from overindulgence.
We find in Buddha‘s philosophy that he also taught his students to pursue the middle path to avoid the two opposing extremes.
Another great philosopher, Confucius, said the same, “Middle ground always leads to mental equilibrium and a harmonious social order.”
Self-awareness is actually knowing the two extremes in our lives and enjoying the moderation.
Many times people try to become intelligent, that’s good but they lack emotion and awareness.
In the real world we have to compensate for the lack of intellect with more emotion, peace, and awareness.
Many successful people say that once awareness replaces intellect, we forget about perfection and focus only on progression.
Progression is simply the compounding of minor improvements, that’s what Linus Pauling followed throughout his life.
Awareness and intelligence sometimes work as light and shadow, brighter the light darker the shadow, as said by Carl Jung.
There are natural things in life like love, hate, birth, death which were the same hundreds of years ago and still the same, but what is different is how we perceive them every single day.
This falls into the category of understanding of humanity as done by Linus Pauling.
We understand this better when intelligence and awareness are mixed and grow together.
Conclusion
Many thousands years ago, the Taoist philosopher, Lao-tzu wrote that the path to wisdom is subtraction of all unnecessary activities.
He said, “to attain knowledge, add things everyday but to attain wisdom subtract things everyday.
Self indulgence, devotion, and meditation invite awareness in different settings which are far from formal education but, as Lao-tzu said, they help to subtract things in our lives to attain wisdom.
Linus Pauling‘s parents did not push him to study chemistry or any other self indulgent activities even though they supported him later.
Linus Pauling not only became the elite mind of science but also the serene mind of humanity.
He understood human life very clearly, he hated warfare, crime, and suffering in human life.
It’s so simple to understand that when our life is more important than our principles we sacrifice our principles. But if our principles are more important than our life we sacrifice our life.
This insight had a profound effect on Linus Pauling so he developed an intense desire to do something with human life and lived it by principles.
I recommend to watch Linus Pauling’s take on the role of scientists in the peace movement.
Yam Timsina, PhD, writes primarily on health basics, scientific progress, social upliftment, and value creation.
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