Peace on Earth is a common Christmas wish but it's the wrong wish. Peace on Earth is the desirable outcome but it would be better to wish for the essential ingredient. The best holiday wish for humanity is curiosity.
There is no room in the curious mind and heart for hate or anger or fear. To be curious is to be open to all of life's experiences. The hand is open to shake another in greeting, to wave hello from a distance, to touch and hold new objects. The eyes are open to see new things. The mouth is open, either to taste new foods or to ask questions. The ears are open to hear the answers. The curious mind absorbs all of this but remains insatiable for the new, rather than trapped in the old and familiar.
That is the danger of Christmas. We glorify the past too much. We should be proud of our traditions and honour them, of course, but we should always look to update them, to make change part of the tradition, even in small simple ways. Cook the turkey a new way this year - brine it, bag it, deep fry it, tofurkey it, turducken it, whatever. Instead of presents, give a receipt for a donation in that person's name to their favourite charity or give an IOU to come over and make meals for when they're sick, to babysit their kids when they need a night off, to shovel their driveway, to mow their lawn, to give yourself to them when they need you.
This generosity of time and spirit is a natural by-product of curiosity. The act of embracing others is identical to the act of embracing new knowledge and acquiring new wisdom. The outcome is humility, the willingness to put others before oneself and the acceptance that we don't have all the answers all the time, that the only true certainty is a degree of uncertainty and the only proper way to greet others is with curiosity. That is a difficult task.
The mind craves certainty, predictability and routine. The animal part of the brain equates surprise with risk and danger. The mind becomes stressed when greeted with the unfamiliar, when the worldview is challenged, when we don't know what to say or how to react. Being curious forces us to constantly think with an active and probing mind, rather than falsely trust that what we see and what we feel and what we think is all there is to the world.
Curiosity fuels the imagination, engaging the brain to go beyond what is predictable and what is possible to what lies over the horizon, unseen and undiscovered. Pursuing the unknown is risky because not only do the curious not know what will be found or what it will mean to what they think they already know, there's no guarantee they will find anything at all. Perhaps there will only be more questions. Perhaps we will find out we were going in the wrong direction.
True curiosity cares not. Curious people are proud of being curious and finding out they were wrong is as exciting and relevant a discovery as finding out they were right.
When faced with the new, the curious ask first. In the same situation, the non-curious react first and the reaction is automatically negative. That doesn't look like food therefore it can't be real food therefore it can't taste good. That doesn't sound like music therefore it can't be real music therefore it can't be good music.
The kind of thinking slides quickly into dangerous territory. That person doesn't act or talk or dress or look like how people should therefore they can't be real people therefore they can't be good people therefore they are bad.
Curiosity exposes the irony that Donald Trump and his ilk have so much in common with terrorist organizations like the Islamic State. What they know is right without question, it is the only knowledge worth knowing and anyone who believes different is not only wrong but dangerous and should be silenced, by whatever means necessary. How could humanity have advanced, as a species and as a society, the curious ask, if we only believed in what we know at the present moment, if we had stopped being curious?
Curiosity is a bridge that transcends all cultures, all languages and all differences. It is the common currency of humanity, a trait we possess in much greater quantity than our animal cousins. When we choose to ignore that trait, we behave like animals. When we connect to it, every aspect of our better selves comes forward, from our thirst for knowledge to our altruism. Sharing, whether it's information or resources or time, fosters collaboration, friendship and even love. Curiosity is the force that attracted us to our mates and it's what keeps that love alive. The curious have already discovered the greatest gift, which is the path to peace on Earth. That's the gift we should give to one another at Christmas and every day.
