Lately, the news leaves me wondering, where’s our wisdom? We’re human beings. We are built to be wise. We are endowed with a tremendous capacity for intelligent use of our intelligence. The wisdom required for managing and stewarding our planet Earth is entirely up to us. We’re the only species who’s got it.

And our troubled, broken world needs a lot of wisdom right now. Every day, all day long, the news supplies us with endless stories of abuse of power, corporate greed, political corruption, disease, war, weird weather, and an unbelievable variety of mean senseless acts.

To most of this I’m initially filled with shock and outrage, followed by an intense frustration for not having any immediate constructive means to channel my anger. This is the powerlessness.

Recently though, I’ve developed a new type of frustration, and it often begins “in a more advanced civilization,…”

In a more advanced civilization, I envision, the daily news heralds positive developments of cooperation, beautification, scientific breakthroughs, creative genius, the discovery of new species and new worlds. Problems and degenerates would be handled swiftly and effectively, with wisdom, for the good of the whole.

My frustration with the world I see portrayed in our daily news is the utter lack of collective wisdom among those few who make the decisions that affect everyone else. In the absence of wisdom is short-sighted greed. In the absence of concern for the good of the whole is merely the good of the stockholder, the good of a few, and sometimes, the good of just one.

There is no collective wisdom in our world.

And when I wonder why, I realize that there is very little wisdom at all. We, the human race, are not very wise. I’ll speak for myself, I’m not very wise.

I have lived a life making decisions in a split second, typically based on an arbitrary collection of emotional reactions, pre-packaged attitudes, incomplete information or my mood at the moment. I’ve made decisions as a result of someone’s shiny persuasion or a good pitch that won me over. I’ve made decisions by default, that is, by not making a decision at all and then, que sera sera. I’ve made decisions over and over again based on how I feel, not what I think; decisions based on what I want, not what is best.

I’ve made decisions with a lack of long and deep thinking. Critical thinking that causes me to question my reactions and motives, that asks the questions “what are my real motives?” “what is in my highest interest?” “what will the consequences be?” “what is in the greater interest?” “how will I feel about this choice in six months, a year, ten years?”

We are capable of wisdom, but our cultures and societies don’t place much importance on it, and let’s face it, wisdom can really get in the way of a good time. My education only meagerly promoted wisdom, my parents, not at all. I remember only a few teachers and professors who encouraged me to develop my capacity for wisdom. For the most part, the word seemed relegated to the philosophers of old, as if wisdom is passé.

But I want wisdom. I want to be wise. I know I will have a better life for it. I know it is a meaningful contribution I can make to this broken world I love and live in.