On a cold, crisp evening like this, I want nothing more than to curl up next to a fireplace with a Snuggie and a puppy. Throw in a caramel macchiato from Starbucks and I’m golden. According to a statistic I just made up, settings like this provoke deep thought 99% of the time. The other 1% is time spent drinking your Starbucks.

But being pensive isn’t as easy as it sounds. You may not even know the definition of pensive (–expressing or revealing thoughtfulness). It’s one of those things that we wish for, you know, to stumble upon some grand eureka or epiphany. You certainly can’t force it, so where do you start?

Well, I like to think of it as going on a first date with yourself. Picture you (and you) sitting at a cafe for lunch. You ask yourself a simple question, “what do you like to do for fun?” And you answer. There you have it, a first date with yours truly.  I admit, I got this idea from an article in Glamour. (What else was I going to read in the nail salon?) But I think it raises an important question–do you know yourself?

Defensively, I would answer, “Um, yes!” But maybe not. Think about it–time spent at Marquette University is probably the longest we have been separated from people, places, memories and events that we let define us in high school. This raises another question, “when you are separated from your surroundings, what defines you?”

…Things just got deeper.

By now we are entering the darkest part of the cave. The space in ourselves that we don’t always shed light on–the dirty shelf in the house, the vacant attic upstairs, or the cold and murky crawl space in the basement. That’s right people, your chamber of secrets. Or as I like to call it, your heart.

So, now beings the final step of introspection. I recommend turning off all distractions and silencing your cellphones.

Imagine your heart as a person you can see. Look at that person. Appreciate them. Respect them. Now ask, “heart, how are you, really?” 

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Pensiveness is taking the time to listen to that answer. Courage is having the self-respect to do something about it.