Learning to Think
I wish, in my youth, that someone would have taught me how to do crossword puzzles. I think it might have helped me learn the art of patience and quiet thinking. My late wife did them, but I don’t know how she came to the practice, or what pleasure it brought here. I needed a mentor to make the suggestion then teach me the art.
But mentors are hard to come by and teachers even more so. So, mostly I just poked along, making do, and figuring things out by stepping in holes and making mistakes. And now I’m late to the world of crosswords, but I’m in it thanks to the New York Times crosswords, the Mini and the Midi, that I discovered while playing Wordle. I’ve dropped the latter in favor of the former, and I also play Spelling Bee which gives me seven letters and suggests I make words from them. Finally, I’ve found a use for my vocabulary and repository of obscure little words.
The puzzles are introducing me to a way of thinking that requires movement in many dimensions. It tests knowledge and my ability to find context as it urges me to discover, what might this clue mean? It’s a struggle. I like quick solutions, and I tend to try and force the issue. But thinking “harder” is bad business. Patience is indeed the required virtue. All of this helps me with my goal to be a learner and have 80 years of experience rather than one year of experience 80 times.s