More is simply more.

It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things. Henry David Thoreau

This morning I discovered a powerful project and book by award winning filmmaker and photographer, Andrew Zuckerman, Wisdom.

I encountered Wisdom at my blog friend Marueen's site this morning, along with her really good question: "What's your definition of "wisdom"? And if you had to make an image of it, what would your photograph or painting or collage of "wisdom" look like?"

My definition of wisdom? A cumulative body of information encompassing all I know, all we've experienced, all I've encountered. Wisdom discerns and directs my thinking into considered and considerate responses, actions... and more thinking.

What would my 'wisdom' look like? It's a ball. Like a globe. It's ever moving. Ever evolving. Ever encompassing new information, discerning, assessing, eliminating, embracing. It is never static. Never satisfied with the status quo. Wisdom always requires more wisdom to keep itself alive. Wisdom knows truth. It never questions lies. It accepts them for what they are. Wisdom is the breathing, living embodiment of my knowledge.

I imagine myself in twenty years. Wiser than I am today. Wise enough to know, I do not know it all. And all I know, all I've experienced, all I've encountered is nothing compared to how much more there is still to know about me and the world around me.

And in my wisdom, today, I know that knowing more about the world around me is nothing compared to knowing who I am and how I am in the world is the greatest gift I can share.

Wisdom isn't about searching for knowledge. It's about knowing where it's at. Recognizing it in the moment and knowing, there's more to come in moments to follow.

That's the challenge. We search for peace. We search for love, tranquility, beauty. We search and find ourselves yearning for more of everything.

Wisdom tells me, more is not better. More is not less. More is simply more.

More wisdom doesn't make me wiser. It simply makes me as wise as I am.

There is a client at the shelter where I work. He doesn't have a lot. He's homeless. What he does have is often given away. "I don't need it," he says.

He's a brilliant artist. Great mind. But, he is often immersed in the alcohol he consumes on a regular basis.

The other day I asked him, "How is your not drinking going?"

"I have good days. I have bad days." He smiled. "I figure I just have to get to a place where I hate myself enough that I quit doing what I'm doing that's so hateful to me."

Pretty wise.

A man with nothing who knows enough to accept he is doing what he's doing to himself. He doesn't blame the world for his drinking. He holds himself accountable. He wants to quit. He's just not 'there' yet.

That's wisdom.

I didn't have the wisdom to listen deeply and keep my judgements out of his comments. "The object is to learn to love yourself enough to quit doing the things that you hate," I said.

He looked at me somewhat cross-eyed. Hello? Like I don't know that?

"I can't get to love until I get through hating myself," he replied and he went back to doing what he was doing.

Can't get around it. Can't get over it. Under it or above it. You gotta go through it.

In the Wisdom video, musician, Bill Withers says, "You can't get to wonderful without passin' through all right."

Journalist, Michael Parkinson says, "You gotta get through the third act."

To get to the third act, we must live through the first and second acts. Perhaps, for my homeless friend, his first and second acts are about living through his self-hatred to fall into love with his third act.

As Wisdom contributor and writer Wole Soyinka says, "You can't control people... Their ultimate essence is constantly craving dignity."

Wisdom tells me that to honour another humour being's craving for dignity, I must honour my own.

I must listen deeply. Nurture the spark of humanity all around me and fall into love with the world I see -- as I see it. As I experience it. As I know it.

Wisdom doesn't grow in denial.

Wisdom grows in truth.

The question is: What's your definition of wisdom? Are you using it wisely?