The Five Tools That Help You Discern in Life: Part 5 “Critical Thinking”

The last tool in this series is Critical Thinking and Rational Reasoning. Most of you are familiar with these terms, but yet tools are needed to improve the application of them in your life. You may have been told in school that you needed to develop good critical thinking skills, but the vast majority of people don’t really know how to do metacognition. Metacognition means, “thinking about your thinking.” Your thinking drives your emotions, speech patterns, and all of your behaviors. You need to evaluate and sift information to do critical thinking and rational reasoning skills. The application of tools for healthy thinking, life, and relationship skills need to be used to do effective critical thinking.

Out of the five tools of discernment that you have learned, people lean unequivocally on emotions and feelings, and critical thinking and rational reasoning. You can tip the scale in either direction using feelings to evaluate your perceptions, or weigh heavily on the analytical rational reasoning. Either way can lead you into error. Our fifth tool is important, but we must use the other tools in balance when using it. Critical thinking is linked to logic. Logic is extremely important in every way. However, not everything can be based solely on logic. Logic cannot always be the dominating factor because in reality your emotions, heart condition filter, and your physical sensations aren’t always logical, but they are real, they do exist, and are necessary to make accurate discernments. Logic is important, but not complete in and of itself.

Critical thinking and rational reasoning can be explained as a system to think through facts, information, applying, analyzing, or evaluating that information with tools to come to a determination. To be rational one hundred percent of the time is not possible. Some things can be logically broken down and explained, and yet other things like faith for example, cannot be logically broken down and explained, but it does not make it untrue. If everything was subject to logic alone, half the things in this world would be false. As humans beings we are finite, and therefore our ability to be logical is incomplete. You have heard it said that “seeing is believing,” but there are many things in this world that cannot be seen, yet they are real; just think about germs, molecules, or the wind.

To complete your toolbox it is crucial to understand that all five of the tools of discernment are mandatory for successful evaluations. When you couple Physical Sensations, Emotions and Feelings, Heart Condition Filter, Spiritual Radar, and Critical Thinking and Rational Reasoning you work through what you sense, how you feel, what triggers you, what you hear from God, and critical thinking, logic and the application of rational reasoning tools, to evaluate information. When combining all of these things you can clearly discern and operate in healthy thinking skills that will better help your to determine your situation and make healthy and godly life, and relationships skill choices.

Copyright  © 2012 by Michele Fleming Ph.D.