Curiosity and Wonder, which one is better?
Curiosity
Curiosity came first. Curiosity came even before wonder when we were first born, into this world. I am sure we were so curious of our surroundings, we sniffed the first fresh breath of air once we were out from our mother's womb like a man gasping for the last breath on his deathbed. We looked at everything with cute little curious eyes. These were the eyes of every criminal, every lawyer, every doctor and every teacher whom we had become, yet only planted with curiosity at the beginning. What happened afterwards was not entirely by choice but rather a bizarre blend of fate and answers to our curiosity questions. Yes, curiosity is a question, which takes different forms like a chimera. Sometimes it is a who, sometimes a How, sometimes a what and sometimes a where and when? Curiosity pushes our emotions on an edge with a surge of adrenalin for adventure. It started with crying excessively until we are consoled by the smell of a mother and milk. Later it found more interesting things to dwell on, more specifics, clouds, trees and cows. Letters words, sentences. Numbers and equations, and long lists of memorable items. Curiosity is the primary driver of any man or women, but what is the great friend of curiosity? What is the reward of the young man who wobbled through the garden among rose plants? It is non other than its twin brother, the WONDER.
Wonder.
definition: a feeling of amazement and admiration, caused by something beautiful, remarkable, or unfamiliar:
Now about wonder I can say much more. I can say it is cheerful; it is pleasant and rewarding, it is positive and triumph. Wonder is the reward for being curious. It is the Aha...! moment, the Wow... ! moment. Exciting moment when we figured out the answers to our curious questions. It is a mini celebration to life, which is guided by random curiosity. It is the pleasure sought by the judge searching for the truth, it is the reward searched by an artist doing a sketching in her notebook. It is the feeling searched by a young man travelled half a world and into a thick tropical jungle to see a rare breed of a green and yellow tree frog. Someone might say by being curious we were looking for wonder. Wonder came later into our lives. And it represented all our smiles at an early age. Wonder was what happened when we associated the smell of the milk and warmth to our mothers, face. Wonder is what happened when someone did a pick-a boo for us.
What happened to curiosity and wonder over time?
Over time curiosity and wonder both were diminished in frequency, as we were learning about lot of things surrounded us. A chair with four legs remarkably looked like a mini house when we were kids, and we wondered about it too. A pencil can represent unlimited happiness of wonder, when we started drawing. But over time, we learned patterns and streamlined our curiosity. We stopped asking curiosity questions, and hence the natural wonder also pruned into a bare skeleton in our daily lives. No wonder why an average adult smiles less and less than a child over time. But I would say it is not dead, inside us both curiosity and wonder are living. You just need to wake them up. That might do better than anything else you have done today, for your future. Not a pile of money, not a dozen of friends, not a basket full of Gems can do better for you for your baseline happiness, than a sharp curiosity which goes hand in hand with wonder.
How are you going to create curiosity and wonder?
Creating a habit of curiosity and wonder is very easy. As it is already established pattern in your brain. You just have to look up to the sky and say, I wonder what that cloud look like? Or just stare at it until it slowly changes. You can look at your dashboard of your car and ask, Have I noticed everything on the dashboard of my car? Or look to the front and just read the numberplate of the vehicle in front of you. Try to count the number of leaves of a tree in your backyard which had been growing alongside your account, over many years. And you will have thousand things to ask questions about. But remember to reward each time you come up with an answer with a "WOOOOOOOW....". That is where a habit will form. And your day will be filled with little Wows. Enough wows, so you feel like a child again, alive and living, compared to the zombie lives of modern humans in Nickle cities.
Wooow.. Look at that bird, it has feathers, and it looks young. What a fantastic beak it has. I wonder he is a father with children?
Wooow.. this grass looks happy, swaying in the wind, like little children dancing on a play.
What is that nasty smell coming from kitchen? Woooow.. it is a dead slug. I wonder why it died? was it an accident? Did it die of natural causes?
Woooow.. half of my wealth disappeared overnight I wonder what happened? Has this ever happened to anyone before? I wonder what my friends and colleagues say about me?
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