“Think for yourself and question authority.”
—Timothy Leary
This is a quote that I can really relate to personally and I have been using it a lot over the years in my signature on discussion boards around the internet.
Timothy Leary was a writer and psychologist, but he was known primarily for his interest in the psychedelic drug LSD. If you know anything about psychedelic drugs, it is likely that you also know about the phrase “Turn on, tune in, drop out” which was coined by Leary.
Too many people these days are accepting too much around them without questioning anything. That's what I believe this quote is about. We are letting the government, the media and most of all the society in general do all the thinking for us.
Let me give you an example. While you might not have noticed it, commercials strongly influence you. They might not have the power to persuade you into buying anything the corporations want you to but they definitely affect the choices you make.
But that's just a very small part of what I am talking about here. There are much more important symptoms of this widespread epidemic. Instead of taking actions based on our own conclusions, we walk in the footsteps of everyone else. We worry too much about what people think of us and we seek acceptance as we try to fit in among them.
We need to start questioning the unwritten rules that our society are starting to set up for us and avoid our own development into robots that are programmed to follow them. We need to start thinking more thoroughly and make up our own minds, draw our own conclusions.
I urge people to free themselves from the intellectual prison that a lot of people have built around themselves. Think about the actions you take. Analyze them no matter how small they are. Start questioning them and the choices you make. Ask yourself “Why?”, “Why should I do this?”.
Do you really have a good personal reason for all your choices and actions or are you just following the invisible and unwritten rules of society?
Beware, the answer to that question can be frightening.