I read something as if for the first time the other day. It went like this.
“ When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom…” Well you know how the story ends.
I quickly point out that both the hero and the heroine did not come out smelling of lavender in this story. Both were seduced and both tried to pass the buck, thereby ‘diminishing’ their culpability.
Even though I had read this fable countless times before, it had escaped my notice that the lady in story had three plausible motives for harvesting the fruit, even though she had explicitly been told not to.
The fruit was good for food, it was good to look at and it gave you wisdom. Now if I spotted something like that, that was within easy reach and free…
But what piqued my interest was the ‘gaining of wisdom’ bit. Over the past few months I have made all sorts of crazy predictions to myself. I reckon by this time… this will happen. At every turn the exact opposite has happened. So now I am taking more deep breathes and I am relishing the joyous liberty of being able to say. “I’m sorry, I don’t know the answer”. So I find myself asking. On what date did I allow myself to be seduced into thinking that I had to have the answer for everything? When did I get so insecure that I started to bluff and bluster?
Friends, its very OK to say “I don’t know.” Sometimes it is better not to know and just get on with the things that we are sure of. The guy and girl in story understood that wisdom comes gift wrapped in consequences.