It is all very well for Socrates to advise us to know ourselves but he is asking an impossible task. We are too complex to know ourselves. We can remember the importance of taking ourselves into consideration. Our background, our tastes, our awareness - all matter. We can keep in mind that who is driving matters. Our age, our health, our education - all the personal matters that affect us and who we are, they all enter into our every experience. So, being aware of our own fingers in the pie, who is driving us - that is a good idea.
Another aspect of his advice is "knowing". Those books I am always nattering on about, "Incognito" by Eagleman and "Seven and a Half Lessons about Your Brain", make clear that our conscious minds, the parts of us that are aware of our achievements and our regrets, are just the tip of what goes on.
You gleefully say, "I just thought of something!", when in fact your brain performed an enormous amount of work before your moment of genius struck. When an idea is served up from behind the scenes, your neural circuitry has been working on it for hours or days or years, consolidating information and trying out new combinations. But you take credit without further wonderment at the vast, hidden machinery behind the scenes.
Far too much goes on in us, even in just our minds, for us to be aware of. So, as we age and mislead and misread each other, let's be gentle and respectful of the complexity of the whole operation.
