Posts

Posted on

How Can We Truly Know Anything?

How can we truly know anything? In Poetic Diction, Owen Barfield argues that meaning is not static. When a logician attempts to fix the meaning of a term, it is inevitably reduced.

Try to define the word “home,” and you are left with something that is no longer much of a home. Try to define your spouse, and before long, you no longer have a spouse.

The meaning of “home” is revealed only to the one who dwells in it poetically. The meaning of “spouse” is revealed only to the one who dwells with them poetically.

According to Barfield, meaning emerges when the poet — maker in Greek — through inspiration, stumbles upon a fresh metaphor that stirs and shifts human consciousness.

“The poet’s relation to terms is that of a maker.” — Poetic Diction

In other words, unless I look at my spouse and allow a fresh metaphor to strike me unexpectedly, I reduce her to less than she is. But if I find the metaphor — or rather, if the metaphor finds me — the meaning will be revealed as a felt change of consciousness.

Modern consciousness recognizes only static meaning because it is bound to a particular lens — the lens of non-participation. That is why the modern world has so little meaning: such a view is inherently reductive.

It assumes that meaning can be grasped by definition, captured within an affixed description, as though it existed independently of the one who perceives it.

But there is no such thing as fixed, static meaning. The Logos of a thing is revealed only in between — in the living relation between myself and the thing. Meaning arises as I participate in it — through inspired metaphor.

The word “meaning” itself has a curious etymology. It comes from the Old English mǣnan, which means “to intend” or “to signify.” Surprisingly, the noun mean (as in Golden Mean) comes from a related Old English term “gemǣne.” Both mǣnan and gemǣne trace back to one common Proto-Indo-European root: mei- / moi-, which means to bind, unite, exchange, have in common.

In other words, meaning arises within a certain means — within a medium, in the shared space, in-between. Signification is revealed only through participation.

Barfield quotes Aristotle:

“The making of metaphors is by far the most important; since this alone does not involve borrowing from somebody else and is [therefore] a mark of genius; for to make a good metaphor is to contemplate likeness.” — Poetic Diction

A good metaphor is inspiration itself — it comes directly from the Spirit revealing the Logos. True metaphor doesn’t borrow anything from anyone; through imagination it ascends directly to God and is granted the gift of Mercurial speech.

Then, it strikes us with a magical wand of sound and shifts our consciousness to contemplate True Likeness. At that point, we no longer need definitions — we know.

Posted on

What Did Carl Jung Say About Jesus?

What did Carl Jung say about Jesus? “Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.” — Carl Jung

For as long as we see evil “out there,” we remain asleep. The moment we recognize it within ourselves, we awaken.

According to Carl Jung, Jesus’s temptations in the desert represent an inner struggle more than a confrontation with an external enemy. Being fully human, Jesus was tempted in every way, just as we are, yet without sin. We sin because we sleep; He did not, because He was awake.

In Jung’s interpretation, Jesus overcame each temptation by becoming conscious of who He was.

In the first temptation —“If you are the Son of God, turn these stones into bread” —the devil invites Him to manipulate physical reality. Feed yourself, don’t live in lack. You are hungry. You can reshape reality to overcome your poverty.

Here, the devil plays on one of the deepest human fears — the fear of going without, the fear of being separate from the Source. When we believe we are separate from the Source, that we don’t have enough, we embark on a journey to “more,” which never ends.

This insatiable desire for more is a symptom of sleep — a sign that we are unconscious of our unity with God. Jesus responds by “eating the true bread from heaven” right there in the wilderness. What did He eat? The will of God. “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work” (John 4:34).

In John 4:34, He was hungry and thirsty before speaking with the woman at the well — and afterward, mysteriously, He was not. The disciples asked, “Who brought Him food?” No one did. He had enough. Always. We all know this experience: when we are seized by true enthusiasm — literally, en-theos, “in God” — hunger disappears.

The second temptation is about becoming special: “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You.’” We all feel this pull. We all want to be singled out, placed on a pedestal as someone exceptional.

Yet, Jesus says that putting God to the test means you don’t believe that you are special already. When we crave specialness, we confess that we do not feel it. We have not heard the heavens open, nor seen the dove descend, nor heard the voice: “You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

The last temptation is the most insidious: save the world by bowing down to the devil. “I can give you the power to end all injustice, all wars, all suffering, all poverty, and make everyone happy — you will be the Savior of the world by establishing your perfect order.

No need to die — you can bring heaven to earth, usher the golden age of humanity this very minute, and make the lives of millions better. Just bow down and bring the necessary sacrifices. Jesus replies, in essence:

“You know the power of force but not the power of a seed. Violence and power are opposites. Violence is sterile — it breeds only more violence. But a seed, when it dies, bears fruit a hundredfold. Worship God alone — for the smallest of seeds holds the true power that transforms the world from within.”

What the devil desires the most is for us to find some external devil to fight with. When we do, we never recognize those same three temptations at work within ourselves each day.

To fight an external devil is to remain asleep; to expose the lies of the inner one is to awaken.

Posted on

Why Are Small Things Important?

Why are small things important? People are preoccupied with size. Somehow, we associate size with significance. When something is small, we don’t make much of it. When something is big, we can’t help but make much of it.

In George MacDonald’s Phantastes, a young man named Anodos meets a fairy. She says she wants to give him a gift, but she is so tiny that he asks:

“How can such a very little creature as you grant or refuse anything?”

The fairy replies:

“Is that all the philosophy you have gained in one-and-twenty years?” said she. “Form is much, but size is nothing.”

To prove her point, “she leapt from the desk upon the floor, where she stood a tall, gracious lady, with pale face and large blue eyes.”

“Now,” said she, “you will believe me.”

He did. But what happened? She grew in size.

He didn’t recognize her form, so she had to change her size. Form is about recognition — it is a matter of the heart. Size is about measurement — it is a matter of the mind.

When something appears to us, the heart perceives the form and recognizes what it represents. The mind immediately begins to measure and calculate—and often miscalculates.

What appears small may one day turn out immense. Size is nothing; form is all that matters. Why else would God Almighty take the form of a baby? So that He might be recognized in that form.

The calculating mind passes over such forms because of their small size. We tend to mistake size for significance. Yet what is truly vast — things of cosmic value — come hidden in the smallest forms.

Only the heart can recognize true significance. The mind is deceived by size. For example, what is more important: to play with your child or to meet with the President? To donate a million dollars to a good cause or to chat with your grandmother over the phone?

When people brought little children to Jesus, the disciples rebuked them. They confused size with significance. Yet, Jesus said:

“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

On the cosmic scale, preaching to the crowds was less significant than playing with the kids.

Peter Sloterdijk, a German philosopher and cultural theorist, argues that civilization is shaped by small groups — small circles of friends.

Jesus and the Twelve, Buddha and his disciples, the Inklings, St. Francis and his band of brothers, Einstein, Marcel Grossmann, Max Planck, and Niels Bohr — the list goes on and on.

Everything big started small — among two or three people gathered together in the name of the Fire they had encountered.

If we want to see true magic, we must learn to recognize the significance of small things — and to question what the mind hastily labels as important. The things that truly transform are never loud, noticeable, or flashy.

Magic hides in plain sight. We miss it because the mind expects a spectacle. But true magic is never a spectacle. It is quiet and ordinary — like a child in a manger or a butterfly fluttering over dandelions in my backyard.

Posted on

What Happens When Fathers Grow Weary of Life?

What happens when fathers grow weary of life? They stop doing what fathers are supposed to do: bear witness to a child that life is good and worth living.

When fathers grow weary, they stop witnessing, and other narratives begin to take root and take over. There are only two types of narratives in the world: one says life is good and worth living, and the other is the narrative of fear.

When the first one stops, the other grows.

In The Silver Trumpet, Prince Courtesy loses his father’s gift, the magical Silver Trumpet. As a result, he loses his wife, and now he is losing his only daughter, Princess Lily — to a narrative of fear.

The wearier the father becomes, the larger this narrative of fear grows. It swells ever larger, like a toad, and eventually becomes an overarching reality that takes the life out of a child. She sees fear EVERYWHERE.

When we lose the father, fear always takes over. The archetypal role of the father is to shine bright.

The English father and the Germanic Vater are etymologically related to Jupiter. The Latin Iūpiter means “Father Jove.” The first part of the word — Iū — is derived from the Proto-Indo-European dyew, meaning “to shine” or “bright sky” (daylight), while piter is related to the Latin pater (father).

In mythological consciousness, a father is the one who shines brightly. A father is the light of your day. In Roman lore, Jove was seen as the source of joy and joviality. In French, the word eventually became jovial, meaning “full of cheer and joy.”

When fathers grow too weary to bear witness to the Light, darkness creeps in. In Owen Barfield’s tale, the evil Princess Gamboy begins to take over — not only Princess Lily’s heart but also the kingdom. Her narrative is fear, represented by a toad.

In Princess Lily’s heart, the light of the father is supplanted by the fear of the toad. As you read, you almost want to exclaim: Why does Prince Courtesy, the father, allow this narrative to continue? Why does he allow Gamboy to poison Lily’s mind?

He is no longer himself; he is no longer the Jupiter he once was. He has grown too weary of life to be a witness.

Darkness is always driven by a narrative of fear. This narrative is incessantly inflated — blown up like a toad — until it becomes an overarching reality in people’s minds. You cannot fight fear or resist it; it thrives on resistance.

There is only one thing it cannot tolerate: the narrative of love coming from the Bright Father.

Barfield writes of Princess Lily: “Oh, if only she had listened to nobody but her Father!” And she would have — if the father had continued to speak.

But he stopped, and Gamboy’s narrative began growing like a toad. How do you stop a narrative of fear?

Someone must recover the lost Silver Trumpet — the light of consciousness — for the narrative of fear to crumble. Someone must blow the Silver Trumpet.

When fathers lose their Silver Trumpet, the world is plunged into darkness. In the absence of Jupiter, the narrative of fear becomes too strong.

Who will find the Silver Trumpet?

The Second Prince.

In Barfield’s story, the Second Prince is the one who is “not deceived by appearances.” He represents the ultimate Christ-consciousness.

Watch our March 14, 2026, discussion of The Silver Trumpet here.

Posted on

What Did Carl Jung Say About Suffering?

What did Carl Jung say about suffering? The larger our ego, the less likely we are to change without suffering. Ultimately, it is the ego itself that generates and multiplies suffering. According to Carl Jung, suffering arises in the soul when we try to inflate the ego instead of dealing with the shadow.

“Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering.” — Carl Jung

The paradox of the ego is this: when we try to escape legitimate suffering — the pain we must go through to embrace our shadow — by boosting the ego, we increase our own suffering.

This is the story of the Prodigal Son. He fled his home to escape himself. He thought he could escape his shadow through reckless living. In his desperate effort to outrun his own shadow, he only succeeded in generating a mountain of unnecessary suffering.

And yet, paradoxically, that very self-inflicted and “unnecessary” suffering proved to be necessary after all. It brought him to his senses. It awakened him.

“The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.” — Carl Jung

Those with an inflated ego rarely change unless the ego is forced to endure the suffering it has brought upon itself.

“There is no coming to consciousness without pain.” — Carl Jung

The AA Big Book recounts the story of an American businessman who, after years of trying unsuccessfully to stop drinking, traveled to Europe to get a consultation from Carl Jung. He completed his treatment with remarkable confidence: physically and mentally restored, and convinced he now understood his mind so deeply that relapse was impossible.

Yet before long, he was drunk again. He returned to Jung and pleaded for the whole truth. The doctor told him:

“‘You have the mind of a chronic alcoholic. I have never seen one single case recover, where that state of mind existed to the extent that it does in you.’ Our friend felt as though the gates of hell had closed on him with a clang.” — (AA Big Book, page 27).

Paradoxically, this became the moment of the gentleman’s awakening. He recovered and lived a sober life. It was the “clang of the gates of hell” that changed him. Often, it is precisely such a clang — the total collapse of illusion — that shatters an overinflated ego.

That lowest point is the pivot. It is there that we cry “Miserere,” with Dante Alighieri, who found himself “in the dark wood,” confronted by the three beasts — his own shadow made visible.

When we realize we cannot overcome our own beasts, we cry out for help. In that moment, our ego shatters — and we are saved. It is the point of coming to our senses, of returning home.

Here, all “unnecessary” suffering comes to an end. Guides appear out of nowhere, leading us into our Inferno to confront our shadow. Little do we know that descending is also ascending. By journeying into our personal hell, we simultaneously rise toward Purgatory and Paradise.

The moment we come to our senses, we know we have a home and a Father. We drop the pig’s food we have been eating and follow the Guide.

Posted on

Where Are my Feelings Located?

Where are my feelings located? When I was little, we lived in Omsk, Russia, next to a large industrial plant where most of my family worked. My sister and I walked past it every day on our way to school, often wondering why the building was so depressing.

Decades later, while reading Owen Barfield, I realized that our childhood perspective was actually a remnant of an older way of seeing the world — which is still so common in children. Back then, I said, ‘The plant is depressing,’ rather than, “I feel depressed when I look at it.”

Barfield points out that a hallmark of modern consciousness is the internalization of feelings; today, when we see the morning sun, we say, “I am happy,” or “It makes me happy” instead of, “The sun is happy.” Even when we say: “The building is depressing” we mean to say: “I feel depressed when I look at it.”

What happened? Are my feelings mine, locked inside my scull or chest? Or are they somehow present in the outside world too?

The child does not yet sharply separate himself from the world — much like the ancients did not. For the child, thunder itself is menacing, the lake itself is calm, and darkness itself is terrifying. These qualities are not “inside” him; they belong to the world as he experiences it. Modern consciousness, however, draws a firm line between inner and outer.

“When we reflect on the history of such notions as humour, influence, melancholy, temper… it seems for the moment as though some invisible sorcerer had been conjuring them all inside ourselves — sucking them away from the planets, away from the outside world, away from our own warm flesh and blood, down into the shadowy realm of thoughts and feelings. There they still repose.” — Owen Barfield, History in English Words

We say, “Lake Tahoe affects me in such a way that I feel calm.” But the very word affect implies a radical separation between myself and Lake Tahoe. For something to affect me, it must stand apart from me as an external force acting upon a passive interior.

But what if affect is the wrong word?

If I say, “The morning sun affects me so that I feel happy,” am I not attributing to particles of gas more than meets the eye — almost a magical power to rearrange my emotional state? Can the happiness I feel before the rising sun be reduced to observable properties in burning hydrogen?

It seems not. Something “else” is taking place.

There must be a connection between myself and the sun — a relation that lies beyond the merely visible and measurable. The sun does not affect me as if from the outside; it is in me. My “self” is part of the world — yet not of the world.

Silence can be healing — not because the absence of sound waves contains detectable medicinal properties. Silence is healing because the outside world is a mirror of what is inside a person. Silence “affects” me because it resonates with my inner silence.

Sunshine makes me happy because it resonates with the sunshine within me. “Deep calls unto deep.” When something resonates, invisible strings outside me align with invisible strings within me.

And when I stand in a concrete jungle and feel heaviness, it is not because concrete possesses measurable depression-inducing particles. We feel depressed because nothing in us resonates. There is misalignment — dissonance rather than resonance.

Feelings are not merely inside; they are an echo of something in the “outside” world. They are a reply to what we perceive as “outside.” What happens when we perceive the world as singing — and ourselves as “singing along”? Something in us shifts.

We come alive and suddenly realize with Maria von Trapp that “the hills are alive with the sound of music.”

Posted on

Does AI Make Us More Human? Hans Christian Andersen on the Machine’s Triumph and Collapse

Does AI make us more human? In her recent video, Julia McCoy, one of the early pioneers in AI content marketing, says that she and her family made a conscious choice to move away from technology — to rural Tennessee, to a real flesh-and-blood community, to forests, to soil-grown food, to a church, to the mountains.

In her video, titled Mountains Over Microchips, she reflects on an uncanny trend produced by the rise of AI: the more advanced AI becomes, the more we humans begin to reflect on what it means to be human.

What is it about me that’s irreplaceable?

According to Julia, people are awakening to the unbridgeable gap between the real and the artificial and are making a conscious choice to move closer to the real. The more the artificial is forced upon us, the more we realize how deeply we desire what is real.

Large AI companies push the narrative: “Upgrade or die” — suggesting that if you do not jump on the AI wagon, you will become obsolete. And yet, Elon Musk was reportedly surprised not to see a flood of volunteers to test his new Neuralink brain chip — an interface between machine and human.

The human mind can be muddled by slogans; the human heart cannot. The heart senses a difference the mind struggles to articulate. As Julia observes, in 2025–26 more and more people have chosen to become homesteaders.

The “whole foods” movement continues to spread across the globe. The price of young hens is rising — people want real eggs and real meat. The rise of the artificial awakens us to what the real feels like. The artificial may fool our eyes — but not our hearts.

In our heart of hearts, we know that real art feels different from AI-generated one. We know that real bread tastes different from synthetic substitutes. We know that real, eye-to-eye conversations with flesh-and-blood people are vastly different from Zoom calls. We know that people in person feel different from the same people on a screen.

Screens are better than nothing, but worse than everything. And we, as humans, need everything.

Perhaps the simplest way to capture what is happening to humanity is through Hans Christian Andersen’s absolute metaphor in The Nightingale.

An Emperor in China hears about a humble nightingale whose song is so beautiful that it moves listeners to tears. He summons the bird to the palace, and its song brings him joy every day.

But one day, the Emperor receives a gift — a jeweled mechanical nightingale. It is dazzling and predictable, singing on command whenever the Emperor desires. The living nightingale is gradually forgotten and eventually flies away.

In time, the mechanical bird breaks. The Emperor falls gravely ill. As Death approaches, the real nightingale returns and sings beside his bed. Its living song restores his strength, and Death itself flees.

“And the Nightingale sang so sweetly that the blood coursed quicker and quicker through the Emperor’s weak limbs, and even Death listened and said, ‘Go on, little Nightingale, go on!’”

Death then returns all the treasures it had taken:

And Death gave back each of these treasures for a song, and the Nightingale went on singing. And he sang of the quiet churchyard, where the white roses grow, where the elder trees blossom, and where the fresh grass is watered by the tears of the living.

Then Death felt a longing for his garden, and like a cold white mist he floated out of the window.”

The Nightingale is the undying symbol of the real. When we hear, see, and touch the real, we come alive. Death itself longs to hear the real and will surrender its treasures for a song — the Song.

Posted on

How Did Aristotle View Matter? The Forest Beneath All Forms

How did Aristotle view matter? Aristotle’s main Greek word for matter is ὕλη (hýlē). Interestingly, hýlē originally meant wood, timber, or forest — the raw stuff one builds with. Why would Aristotle choose such a word to name the underlying constituent of all things?

What does wood have to do with matter?

For Aristotle, hýlē represented the potential — not actuality.

“Matter (hýlē) exists potentially, while form (eidos) exists in actuality.” — Metaphysics

In other words, hýlē is matter as potential — something not yet formed. This may well be the reason why the word was later translated into Latin as materia, derived from mater (“mother”). Originally, however, materia also referred to wood or building material, especially timber taken from a tree.

The proximity of materia to mater (“mother”) is not accidental: both hýlē and mater point to that which gives birth, nourishes, and brings forth. For Aristotle, wood is the most fitting metaphor for potentiality.

Just as a mother brings a person from potentiality into actuality — not by imposing a shape from without, but by allowing form to emerge from within — so wood (hýlē) represents something waiting to be shaped. Matter is not dead or mechanical, not a mere standing reserve.

It is something living that grows and reveals its potential in various forms. The ancients saw matter not as something we shape but as something that shapes us. Wood is not something we grow; it is something that grows us. That is why the first thing God did after creating Adam and Eve was to plant a garden in the East.

God knew that humans could realize their potential only among living things. It was the Garden that shaped Adam, not vice versa. The Garden was the womb that would shape Adam into the person he was made to be. As Adam tended the Garden, the Garden tended Adam. Adam grew the Garden, and the Garden grew Adam.

Humans grow only in the garden — that’s why we have kindergartens. We must have “adult-gardens” as well. That is what Elder Amphilochios (Makris) of Patmos must have felt when he told people, after receiving their confession, that their penance was to plant a tree.

Curiously, older descriptions of Patmos note that the island historically had very few trees. Today, there are areas of pine, tamarisk, cypress, mastic, and other trees growing naturally and in groves. The island is turning into a garden.

If you want to grow, you must grow something. Resilience to evil comes to those who, like hobbits, “love all things that grow.” The only way to overcome evil is to be rooted in the soil of the earth — which is “deeper magic.”

As St. Amphilochios used to say to his many disciples:

“Do you know that God gave us one more commandment, which is not recorded in Scripture? It is the commandment “love the trees.” When you plant a tree, you plant hope.”

Posted on

What is the Hidden Message of Groundhog Day?

What is the hidden message of Groundhog Day? I would never have thought there was something in Groundhog Day that I didn’t know. I thought I knew the movie by heart. Apparently, I didn’t. To memorize something means to commit it to memory; to learn something by heart means to commit it to the heart.

As my wife and I watched the first few minutes of the movie last night, she suddenly asked, “Why is the groundhog’s name Phil — just like Phil Connors?” Her question sent me reeling. How could I have missed it? Yes! Phil Connors is Punxsutawney Phil. He is the groundhog of the story.

According to Pennsylvania Dutch legend, if a groundhog emerges from its burrow on February 2 and sees its shadow, it retreats into its den and winter lasts six more weeks. If it does not see its shadow, spring arrives early.

Phil Connors is a weatherman—but he is under the weather. He’s fed up with people. He is under his own shadow, though he is unaware of it. His skies are overcast 24/7. Rita and Larry try to pull him out of his shadow, but he always retreats into his den. People drive him nuts — and into his “den.”

When you are under the weather, people always drive you nuts. You want to retreat, withdraw, and languish quietly under the weather of your own exclusivity. Your shadow grows large and frightening. You want to hide. Everyone with a big shadow has a den to hide in — from himself and from others. The shadow is a scary thing.

How do you get out of it?

Spiritually speaking, my shadow is always there until I become aware of it. It remains until I realize its presence. The moment I see it, it is gone. When I become aware of my own shadow, I look behind me and do not see it. My spring has come.”

Phil’s shadow is enormous. He hates his job, he hates his circumstances, he hates people. And like Punxsutawney Phil, he retreats into his “den” to get away from it all. He is not yet aware of his own shadow even though he lives under it 24/7.

So he hides from himself and from others. His “den” is his Groundhog Day. He is trapped in his den — in his own shadow — locked in a vicious circle. How do you escape your own shadow?

All vicious circles are broken the moment we die. All shadows are trampled down by death to self. The Paschal hymn —“Christ trampled down death by His own death”—carries profound spiritual wisdom. It foreshadows the death of the shadow.

Phil remains stuck in his “den” — February 2 — until he becomes aware of his shadow and agrees to die to himself. He passes through the vicious cycles of his own Inferno and Purgatory until, One Day, he finally lets go. The next morning he wakes up — and there is no shadow. It is gone! His spring has come.

Phil Connors is a “weatherman under the weather” who is unaware of his own shadow. That shadow binds him in a vicious cycle of misery until he recognizes it and… releases it.

The moment we die to ourselves, we are freed from the shadow. A new day dawns. And it is February 3. Spring is coming.

Posted on

What is the Origin of the Word Data?

What is the origin of the word data? What is data? Here’s a definition I found online:

“Data is raw, unorganized facts, figures, symbols, or observations that represent details about events, objects, or phenomena. As the basic, unprocessed units of information, data can be numerical (quantitative) or descriptive (qualitative). Once collected, structured, and interpreted, data is transformed into valuable insights used for decision-making.”

However, if you look up the etymology of the word data, you will see that it means “something given” — a gift. It comes from the Proto-Indo-European root do-, “to give,” and belongs to a whole family of words related to giving, such as donation, dowry, Pandora, Theodore, and even дар (gift) in Russian.

The difference between the modern understanding of data and its original meaning is subtle but telling. In our time, data is all about collecting information, as if it were simply there for the taking. In the past, however, data meant a gift — and gifts must be recognized.

For example, when I look at my legs, I can collect all sorts of data about them, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I have recognized them as a gift. Recognizing a gift is always a matter of awareness, not calculation.

Even if I collect all the “data” about my legs — length, weight, width, and so on — I still don’t truly know what they are. I only know what they are when I become aware that they have been given.

“When we were children we were grateful to those who filled our stockings at Christmas time. Why are we not grateful to God for filling our stockings with legs?” — G.K. Chesterton

My legs are a given — datum. But my knowing what they are is not a given — not datum. Properly speaking, data is a gift recognized. All measurements and calculations made prior to this recognition diminish knowledge rather than increase it.

True knowledge is born from the awareness of a gift. The modern approach to data leads to the diminishment of true knowledge because it is not rooted in wonder — the awareness that we possess nothing yet have been given everything. Without awe and wonder, data becomes anti-knowledge.

What is anti-knowledge? It is a husk of knowledge, devoid of substance. Unless I recognize the gift of legs in my stockings, I live under the illusion of knowing. To know my legs is to experience the awe of having them. That is true knowledge — true data.

True data grants joy, not control or power. When I become aware of the gift of legs, I am struck by the joy of walking on them. If I believe I possess them by right, I will feel no joy. Joy is the overflow of awareness that I dwell within a gift.

Data is a given, but we cannot take it for granted. If we do, we fail to understand that it has been granted. Awareness of a gift is the only antidote to taking things for granted.

We speak of “harvesting” data, “processing” data, “owning” data. The language reveals the posture: reality is no longer a gift but a standing resource. And once reality becomes a resource, wonder goes. What remains is manipulation.

But gifts cannot be manipulated without ceasing to be gifts. To know the meaning of data we must turn and become like little children. A child knows their legs not by measurements in inches, but by the measure of delight in using them.

A knower is a lover, not a consumer. A lover doesn’t stand outside and analyze; he stands within and is astonished.

Recovery of true knowledge begins with a conversion of attention — a return to wonder. It’s all about learning to master thinking through thanking.