What Jeopardy Has Taught Me!

I don’t know about you, but I must admit that I watch Jeopardy! [which bills itself as America’s favourite game show] every night - even the reruns. I guess I hope I just might do better getting the answers the second time round! I have lost count of the number of times I have heard a contestant add an extra word, an unneeded piece of information like a first name for example, only to be wrong on the non-essential and lose credit for the answer. Being terse and succinct wins out every time.

But Jeopardy has taught me something else over the years of watching, something that is both easier and harder to do. I have noticed that when the clue is read usually a word pops into my head, a word that is more times that not the correct answer. The thing that is amazing to me is that I have no idea where or why that word appeared so my immediate reaction has been ignore it and wrack my brain for the ‘right’ answer. Hanging onto and trusting in my intuitive response is incredibly difficult. Accepting that I actually ‘know’ something without knowing how or where I acquired the knowledge is unbelievably difficult to do even when it happens over and over again at 7:30 on weeknights.

Religion seems to me to be another place where we look to the ‘right’ answers given by someone else and often ignore the intuitive, gut feelings and answers we already have, Our answers can’t possibly be right! We aren't scholars, we haven’t spent years and years studying religion, we don’t have either title before our names or the letters after it that give us credence. We are used to being told that “we couldn’t possibly understand - so not to worry about it!” Accepting a set of belief statements and doctrines, knowing the ‘right’ answers, saying the right words, are all the easy way to go.

This really comes down to having confidence in oneself, in one’s ideas, and in one’s intuition. This is arguably the greatest gift you can give someone else - the confidence to trust their own intuition enough to follow it where it leads. Real education happened when we entered a course of study hoping to add more knowledge and come away not only with more knowledge but also knowing that the intuitions we started with have been confirmed and deepened. That gift was given to me. I hope it has been given to you too.

"This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,

Thou canst not then be false to any man."

Hamlet Act 1, scene 3, 78–80

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NUDGINGS: a journey into the unknown

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