A Meditation on Curiosity

Ever-curious Editorial Assistant Bethany Sharman sparks questions about innate curiosity and the quest for knowledge to conquer the unknown.

There is an old proverb, still recited today, that used to play in the back of my mind every time I was afraid to try something new. “Curiosity kills the cat,” they said, and I was inclined to believe them. But that is not the end of this phrase, in fact it is only half of it. And in adopting this second half, I have come to inherit a great passion for the unknown. I find myself now in the company of all those curious minds that came before me, standing on the precipice of discovery — whether great or small — certain of only one thing: my uncertainty. 

Humanity has long understood the sacredness of curiosity. It is the destined conqueror of fear. Our ancestors looked hungrily to the seas and skies, guided by the spirits of wonder. They wrote with inquiring minds of curiosity not as a fatal diagnosis, but as the gift of existence. Our society gorges on the feasts of proclaimed knowledge, convinced that all the answers are just a click away. Yet do we not, still, find ourselves up late into the night, pondering the “why”, the “how”, and the “what if”?

There is something so ethereal about curiosity. It’s noticing the world come back to life in the springtime and marveling at how it all happens. It's waking up during the quietest hours of the morning to meet the sunrise. You watch with mounting anticipation as that great ball of fire rises steadily over the waves. As water crashes on sand, arrows formed from light pierce the darkness of ignorance. Perhaps they will also illuminate that bulb in your mind; a flash of an idea from a moment’s inspiration. 

Curiosity has a tendency to worm its way into even the most mundane moments of our lives. It is the mortar between the bricks of lived experience. We decipher body language and search for the truth in each other’s eyes. Curiosity is finishing the crossword puzzle, guessing the plot twist, and getting an X-ray. It’s looking under fake rocks and pebbles for the key. It’s a child opening one stacking doll at a time, peeling back its layers to find the core. The question on that child’s lips is not asked again and again out of immaturity, but rather innocent wonder at a world observed for the first time. 

In the end, we cannot help but open Pandora’s box. We tamper with the unknown in an attempt to quench our thirst for knowledge. We long to peer beneath the surface, to see what is unseen. We insist on an answer and push the limit to find out just how far we can go. And sure, maybe curiosity killed the cat, but I wonder if satisfaction can bring it back to life.