She stops, pauses, turns to the left to glance at some possible threat or irregularity, and then continues to the north. This motion, so intensely human, transcends time.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the human ability to respond to potential threats and the significance of such actions over time.
Mary Leakey's quote emphasizes a fundamental aspect of human behavior: our instinct to assess our surroundings for threats before proceeding. This seemingly simple motion of stopping and looking around evokes a deep understanding of our evolutionary past and illustrates how our responses to the environment are timeless and intrinsic to what it means to be human.
In practice
In a discussion about human evolution at a seminar, one might use this quote to highlight our innate instincts.
There were details like clothing, hair styles and the fragile objects that hardly ever survive for the archaeologist-musical instruments, bows and arrows, and body ornaments depicted as they were worn... No amounts of stone and bone could yield the kinds of information that the paintings gave so freely
I dug things up. I was curious. I liked to draw what I found.
Basically, I have been compelled by curiosity.
No amounts of stone and bone could yield the kinds of information that the paintings gave so freely.
In the egoic state, your sense of self, your identity, is derived from your thinking mind - in other words, what your mind tells you about yourself: the storyline of you, the memories, the expectations, all the thoughts that go through your head continuously and the emotions that reflect those thoughts. All those things make up your sense of self.
When there’s something in the Word of God that I don’t like, the problem is not with the Word of God, it’s with me.
The greatest human attainment in all the world is for a life to be so surrendered to Him that the name of God Almighty will be glorified through that life.
Re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.
Throw away the light, the definitions, and say what you see in the dark.
It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly. And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.
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