Slow Havamal: 18

[kylec]

In the 18th verse, we learn that in order to understand anything about how other men think, one must wander far and wide.

The place we start our wanderings is our home. When we travel far, we leave familiar surroundings and encounter many things, some expected, some surprising. These things add to our picture of the world and the way we understand it. Every sorority girl knows that the best hobby anyone can have is “travel,” which often amounts to getting drunk in exotic places. I’ve traveled only a little, and I can scarce claim to have learned much from it. There’s a difference between going somewhere to do the things you normally like to do, and going somewhere to learn and be different. Most of us default to the first type of travel. The second cannot be planned, it can only be encountered, and it may not go as we intended.

Our minds and the thoughts that make them are also our home. Even when we remain physically within our local area, our minds can still wander great distances. To always think as I normally think means I will only understand men who think like me. My travels would be those times I set aside my own perspective and genuinely try to understand what someone else is saying. I can hear his argument with an open mind, just as I can gaze into the distance at nothing in particular and let the scene unfold. As soon as I bring my own inferences to bear, I’ve returned to familiar ground. So wandering begins as an act of participation. I look, but don’t speak. I stand as a part of the thing and allow it to move me.

That doesn’t mean I have to move there permanently. I can give careful consideration to some other view, grasp it, and decide to let it go. But I’ve gained wisdom from the act, and comparing that place with my home will yield more still, as I notice the differences and similarities, and the new highways that reveal themselves only when two things meet in a certain way. Wisdom is the experience of the journey, every inch of every mile. It’s also the way it alters your future travels. Odin bids us to go meet the world on its own terms. Whatever we find, the home to which we return will be a different one entirely.