The mind becomes conditioned to skepticism, which then develops into an overall way of being in the world, a chronic posture of skepticism, very much to the mind's detriment. Ultimately, skepticism persists as nothing but a bad habit, necessary in the way that bad habits always seem necessary, but of little redeeming value to the human species.
"But," some will argue, "don't we need a skeptical mind to do good science?"
To the contrary, children really make the best scientists. During their early years, children voraciously explore reality, touching, tasting, and smelling life, testing, trying out, and learning constantly, absorbing vast quantities of data. Their brains expand in great bursts of cellular growth, their eyes and ears wide open and accepting of everything. They steadily expand their understanding of the world, figuring out gravity and nourishment and human relationship, a breakthrough every hour, a Nobel prize worth of discovery every day—and they do it all, this prodigious learning, without the slightest trace of skepticism, without the slightest need for doubt, distrust, or disbelief. Rather, the child's wide-eyed innocence and absolute believing makes all such learning possible.
Sit down before fact like a little child, and be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. —T.H. Huxley
Skepticism by nature and definition undermines health, for it begins with the denial of the essential human spirit, a denial that tragically prevents that spirit from coming forth in the world. Far from protecting, such chronic skepticism stifles and suffocates the body, narrows the vision, depresses the mind, inhibits relationship, and argues feverishly against the very possibility of embodied spirit.
Doubt is not ultimately transcended through beliefs. Doubt is a state of mind that is fundamentally without content. It is an expression of the contraction of the being. It is not cured with positive beliefs that are the opposite of doubt. It is cured by the release of this contraction so that there is a continuity between consciousness and forms and relations, an unobstructed continuity between the being and Reality altogether. —Da Free John
The more fervently we argue against our creative powers, the more surely we disempower ourselves.
Unless otherwise noted, all text is from the book, Dancing With the Fire (Bear & Co, 1989), by Michael Sky.