ReThinking Thinking Series
A 6-Week Primer Course for Apologetics, Theology, or Common Sense
1. Introduction: Repairing Your Mind
The search for truth begins at the same point for all of us: where the desire for truth is more important than having our own beliefs validated. Most of us, if we are honest, would rather have our deeply held beliefs be left alone than to be challenged and found to be lacking. It is frightening at first to willingly let yourself challenge yourself. Carl Jung says, “The thing you most need is in the place you most don’t want to look.”
The certainty and security we have felt over the years is waning in the upheaval of 2020. It may be exposing that our belief systems are more vulnerable than we previously imagined. We must be courageous and examine our foundations to see if they will hold in the future.
This series is going to show you how to prepare your mind for deeper and clearer thinking. How to shut out the noise of confusion, to hear the echoes of truth. The challenge is in quieting our minds to hear and really listen, and to learn the disciplines that will allow us to decipher information correctly. We must know our minds to understand our future.
Listen Here [First Session Audio]
2. Refocusing Your Questions.
No question is off limits in life, but to get to better answers we have to learn to ask better questions. We begin this section by posing a simple question:
Do words have objective meaning?
The answer to this has to be parsed out by understanding what the difference between objective and subjective is, in relation to language. Was it socially constructed or discovered? Is “My Truth” different from “The Truth.” We will journey through the evolution of language to the Post Modern/Post Truth communication philosophies of our current day. It will take us on a Journey from Genesis 1 to C.S. Lewis to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Answering this simple question sets us on a path to answer all other questions. It is vital and truly foundational. From here we can delve correctly into more diverse and complex questions.
3. Rediscovering Thinking
What does it mean to think? Is following a thought, thinking? Clinical Psychologist, Jordan Peterson, suggests that thinking is having a thought and immediately challenging that thought with opposing views. Are you prepared to begin to think, to try to prove yourself wrong? Are you prepared to let personal thoughts go if they are proven to be wrong, harmful, and incoherent? How far are you willing to go to find Truth?
Thinking requires another layer, a meta-layer. You can actually think about thinking!! This talk will take us into consciousness, self-awareness, archetypes, and literature. We will wrestle with questions like: Who are you? And how can you think about being yourself? Do you know how to read your own story, or how to write a better version in the future? Can literature and myth be good guides to your personal growth?
The great asset of humanity, and the most elusive, is the concept of consciousness. Descartes said, “I think therefore I am.” Consciousness is the final frontier of the human experience. There is so much that we don’t know about it, but in order to be able to think, and think well, you are going to have to have a basic understanding of what it can do for you. The great minds of Freud, Jung, Peterson, Frankl, Doyle, and Lewis will guide us through this process. This is the beginning of understanding imagination.
4. Re-forging Your Tools
We have learned how to clear our minds, ask better questions, and are prepared to think at a much deeper level. The next step is that we must reforge the tools that you are going to use to shape this renewed mind of yours.
I challenge any thought, opinion, or news story with Aristotle’s 3 Laws of Logic, then to Correspondence and Coherence theory, followed by a bevy of Logical Fallacy tests. These three steps alone will eliminate a majority of confusion and anxiety about the trueness or falseness of a statement.
It seems simple, but it is a discipline that one’s mind must be trained in to prevail. It is just grunt work to master this. Reason of this magnitude must be forged, there is no other way. However, once you begin to master it, you will began to notice logical fallacies everywhere. It will be truly eye-opening.
5. Reshaping Your Beliefs
“It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognize, out of a number of facts, which are incidental and which vital. Otherwise, your energy and attention must be dissipated instead of being concentrated.” –Sherlock Holmes, The Reigate Puzzle
This is where we put it all together...Imagination and Reason. We will take a trip from Baker Street to Narnia. There are methods that Sherlock Holmes used that are not only relevant today but are tired and true methods to uncover Truth, to solve the equations, and crack the case. Both C.S. Lewis and Sherlock Holmes use a reasoning method called Abductive Reasoning.
This form of reasoning allows one to examine all the “vital” information or clues and make an inference to the best possible explanation. One of Sherlock's axioms is, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.” (The Sign of Four). If we use our clear minds, our rebirthed imagination, and our reforged reason, we will be able to solve even the most complicated mysteries with confidence.
6. Re-Establishing Your Place in the World
This is a very important part of this series. How do you take this newfound confidence and truth, and present it to people who may wholeheartedly reject it for no good reason? I Peter 3:15 tells us to be ready to give an answer to those who ask about our hope, but to do it with grace and humility. It can be hard to be humble when someone is demonstrably wrong and berating you and telling you that you’re the one who is wrong. This happens more in Social Media contexts but can also happen in real life. So, what do you do? Is there an Art to Conversation?
Understand there are Three ways of speaking: Past someone, At Someone, or To someone. You want to be the latter. There is always common ground to be sought after, but it will take dissecting the questioner and the question to find it sometimes. Always present your opinion or thoughts to others. Never demand they accept them as fact.
And then there is Stark’s 2-Questions Method I developed that will help diffuse many contentious situations.
Once you have mastered your mind, your reason, and your tongue, you are well on your way to being a benefit to this world, bringing both salt and light.
Course Sign-Up
Fill this out to sign up for a Course, to Host a Course, or if you have questions about the Course.
Use this form to request Pricing Info. [Click Here to Purchase Course]