“Each man is a good education to himself, provided he has the capacity to spy on himself from close up.” Pliny
The more I contemplated this, the more it intrigued me. It occurs to me that we regularly acknowledge the education we receive from other sources, from books, from other people, yet it seems true that if we let them, our own experiences, and our reactions and responses to them, stand to be our greatest teachers. But there is that condition in the quote – “provided he has the capacity to spy on himself from close up.” I might replace “capacity” with “willingness,” but either correctly implies both a reluctance to and a cost of this spying “from close up.” Any amount of honest introspection will reveal a healthy share of bonehead moves, blunders, and over/underreactions to things from my past. And while it makes sense that these provide fertile ground for education to blossom, well, let’s just say it is generally less painful to learn from others experiences than from my own. Still, the point is, I have a lot to learn from myself.
It occurs to me... 