Wisdom: what is it, and is it worth the effort?

Wisdom, what is it and how does one get and use it? Is it worth the bother?

What is the relationship between knowledge and wisdom?

Is wisdom the same for the cat as for the mouse it chases? Does wisdom get a grade, a score, such as "barely passing", "A+", or "flunked"?

Is the comprehension of wisdom the same for people divided up among the four Temperaments: is wisdom the same for the Artisan as for the Idealist, or same for the Guardian as for the Rationalist?

For the homeless person as for the rich elite person?

Who needs to apply wisdom? Is there ever a time when any person does not need to apply optimum wisdom? Learning from the past becomes knowledge, especially when generalized to archetypal morphological form such as "1+1=2"; or that "when it gets very cloudy out it might rain soon." Is that wisdom; or does wisdom involve more of what that knowledge might provide in some circumstance, involving overall context.

History kind of was recorded examples of peoples' doings mostly to each other, and tries to make some sense of it, pointing out that similar stuff could happen again, without more wisdom being applied. Some people crave the fracas: are they to be considered the cause of the rampant destructive grief others endure? We strive to learn from history, but learn what, exactly? Again, is wisdom the same for the cat and the mouse; the Artisan and the Idealist? Does the survivor of a gladiatorial fracas become the embodiment of wisdom thereby? Yet surely, somewhere in history one ought to be able to find wisdom for use in the present.

Maybe wisdom is as elusive as grasping for a steam of water meandering through the woods; yet also that stream is there from which to drink a few handfuls; a few sips may be all that one can utilize now.

Wisdom involves determining choice potentials, and making choices. That is something that could be said about it. Another consistent thing seems to be that to increase wisdom, one needs to look at the bigger picture, seeing the larger repercussion potentials. Assemble a big enough picture and some of the heavy questions seem to fade away, merging into context with a larger whole. Wisdom takes a lot of effort and rewards by satisfying in the much larger context.

Yet, wisdom probably won't provide the attention-getting excitement of ongoing fracas, of gaming about life, the vigorous playing of the sport of strife and conflict.

So wisdom is about choices and questions. Wisdom reaches for and finds place within the much bigger picture, the wholeness in which to play out in a small area that then echoes throughout. It is about who oneself is.