Seriously, how do you make sense of the following two proverbs of sort:
Do not take your body where your mind has not gone.
The amount of time inspecting a dangerous situation is directly proportional to the amount of time you are likely to spend in it.
The first one
could be attributed to Timothy Leary, whose mind went many places before his body. Now, his “body” is able to follow. May he enjoy the trip. 
On a serious note, it sounds like “Look before you leap.”
Taj
Sounds pretty straightforward
Before undertaking any risky acitivity you should spend a sufficient amount of time thinking it through/learning about it first so that you will know how to react when you do it. Visualization is a powerful tool. If you have repeatedly thought through how you will react to a situation it becomes much more automatic when it happens.
rhetorical nonsense
I don’t think I would have learned half the things I know about kayaking unless I’d been willing to take a few chances. Granted maybe this isn’t the way everyone should do it, but, alas taking risks is part of life.
Shouldn’t that proverb read, the time spent considering a situation is inversely proportional to how long you will spend in it?
Risky paddling
– Last Updated: Mar-11-05 10:47 AM EST –
Evans-
the first is certainly great advice for paddling in risky conditions-cold water, ocean swells, and fog. I'll also differentiate between the brain and the mind. They are different. The brain gains knowledge, stored in memory,for paddling in such conditions. This is accomplished by attending courses and instruction, reading books, and reading advice on this website. The mind is a different level. The mind is the decision-maker, interpreting what the brain knows, and determining if that knowledge is sufficient to go forward. The mind houses panic and anxiety, confidence, comfort level, and wisdom. For example, the brain may have the stored data that you can roll in 40 degree water. The mind interprets whether you are up to it that day, want to, etc. The brain is the computer, the mind is the conscience.
The second one can be easily explained in one word, preparation.
Interesting
The first I would interpret as roughly equivalent to “Look befor you leap” as someone else has stated.
The second looks more like the test taking addage, “Go with your first answer.” In other words, if you stand there looking at the bad situation too long there is a strong likelihood that you or the group will decide to go for it, even though your first head and gut sense was to not go for it.
My first thought was that truly life
altering experiencer that few can prepare for - MARRIAGE!
WW version of the second one…
The time spent contemplating a nasty hole is directly proportional to the amount of time you’ll spend getting trashed in it.
I think William Nealy may have popularized this one.
Could it be the inverse with marriage?
– Last Updated: Mar-11-05 11:21 AM EST –
Do not take your mind where your body has not gone?
Kind of Like…
…Never put your face anywhere you wouldn’t stick your finger.
Absolutely the best post
ever on this site Topher!!! What did woman on the beach say to Michael Jackson? Hey, get out of my son…
that one I do follow
the other one is to never eat anything bigger than my head.
Oh and just like the Tom Waits song,
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, and never drive a car when you’re dead.
BCU Handbook
They are from the BCU handbook which is peppered with such pithy reminders that all it not obvious, that sometimes things are not intuitively straight foward, that not thinking can cause things as can too much thinking. And so on. The Brits do have a way of appreciating difficult situations on the water.
Just thought might be nice to lighten up a bit around here. Great responses, made my day!
"Plan ahead"
Both say about the same thing (also think the second should be inverse to make sense).
Good thought, but easier said than done
Thinking ahead and visualizing problems is valuable stuff, but a lot of on-the-water experiences can’t really be visualized effectively until you’ve been out there a few times and know what it is you’re supposed to be visualizing. One of the things I notice most as I spend more time on the water is how much better I’ve gotten at filtering the stuff I really need to see and feel from all the other stuff that’s going on out there. Things seem to happen a lot more slowly now than they did at first, I have more time to react, and I mostly reserve my adrenaline rushes for actual threats instead of stuff that looks scary but isn’t. There’s still lots of value in the visualizing and the what-ifs–they tend to keep me awake sometimes, especially after more intense experiences on the water–but it takes time on the water, too.
Verily so!
Yep that is so true, it is hard if not impossible to know what you don’t know. Actually big time research study showed incompetent people in a sport can easily overestimate their ability but most dangerous is their tendency to underestimate the knowledge of truly competent people and to write them off as arrogant know it all, superior types and thus not listen to them. No wonder life is so complicated.