I have said before that leadership, and its essential adjunct, decision-making are attainable through the processes of retrospect, prospect and introspect. (add the suffix, ion, to each of these, and you will anger a spell-check app, but get the chain-of-execution I am advocating for the tasks at hand) While we can all know ourselves, within given contexts, to know one's self completely is a tall order, which is probably why von Goethe considered it a non-starter. So, introspection is an algorithm---a tool for getting something; or somewhere; or both. And, if all these learned men were right (or at least partially so), maybe all that means is that they failed to consider introspection as a means, rather than an end; a tool, instead of an output at which the tool is directed. I cannot imagine how we might have gotten where we are without introspection: it is part of the big picture. Seems to me.

Introspection may be a motivator of behavior. It is subjective and may be biased. Even if it is it may be a starting point. Substantiating or failing to substantiate introspections requires seeking secondary unbiased sources. This can be both humbling and rewarding.

FOOTNOTE:
这周我开始读Wilfrid Sellars的《经验主义和心灵哲学》。他在第九章中谈到了一些关于内省的有趣的事情。他对思想和语言学作用的思考也具有启发意义，但没有回答人类是否在有语言之前就有思想的问题。这就好像想象了一个顶点:在语言还处于初级阶段(或根本不存在)的某个时刻，人类还没有思维——至少从我们现在所认为的思维的意义上来说是没有的。然后，在不知什么时候，当人们发现他们的声带已经进化出了，不仅能发出呼噜声和尖叫，还能创造出表达生活和环境中常见事物的词语之后，语言进化了，思维也随之进化了。这一切都太神秘了，太玄幻了，就像一条长腿的鱼。那么，人类的一个时代什么时候结束，下一个时代什么时候开始?Cusp-ish——显然,Cusp-ish。但是，这是一个来自哲学的论点吗?人类学? Or is it just another chicken-and-egg moment, enigmatic, yet hardly worth spending undue time with?

If we can grant that humans had thoughts, before they were able to vocalize them, we are more than halfway there---but this begs the other, more ultimate question: when did humans become human? That, is the right question. And the answer, if there is one, very much depends upon what we finally learn about evolution, if, and only if, we are able to learn anything more than we already know. Otherwise, we are just spinning our wheels...adding fuel to under-graduate and post-graduate fires. Much of what we know changes. Has to. That's the beauty of thought. And science. And philosophy.

Michelangelo said if you are looking for truth, study nature. And if by fortune you find the truth you were searching for, then you will also have found the truth of One's own self. Truth is indivisible, equal or One and the same. E pluribus unum! The inspection of nature is the introspection of self. In is out. The proof is in the measure. =

I agree, it takes a bit of practice and a few yoga fundamentals to manage an introspective. It's the core of one of my opinions as to why i think were're instict driven animals that think primarily through bias appeasement rather than the open minded rational humans that we thought we were

Most people(7billion minus one) cant even tell you what an equivocation fallacy is when reading the word "race."

如果某件事是“完美的”，那么它只能是它被制造出来的样子。和其他完美的东西一样完美所有的计算都是一样的。如果那个“完美的东西”有了缺陷，那么它就会变得独特。我认为重要的是，我们要花时间考虑我们在改变和不完美的状态下的自我，这是获得自我意识的一种方式。

“Knowing thyself” depends mainly on three factors: genetics, karma (in a broader sense than ethical only) and environment. The first two factors can be summarized as follows: we can say that the basic nature of each human being is a mixture of two basic features, either emotional or rational in the sense of strict reasoning or, better saying, in accordance with sciences. I have strong reasons to believe that, graphically represented and considering the duality mainly emotional/mainly rational, the basic nature of all humans, or of all human in a country, is a Gaussian curve. So and concentrating mainly in the curve extremes, people are either strongly emotional or strongly rational. For me it is clear that it is much more difficult for emotional people to know thyself (it is the known problem of the emotional intelligence). But here comes in the role of external environment. That is and characterizing, I believe it is possible, for an emotional basic nature to get through its lifetime a good knowledge of itself and, on the other end, for a basic rational nature to get a bad knowledge of itself.

Not sure how (or if) it may fit into this discussion, but I'm putting the finishing touches on a quip of mine concerning pride, hubris and vanity, and hope to share it soon with anyone reading the Philosophy Talk blog. Introspection is something we all ought to use more of, especially in view of the modern penchant for narcissism; extremism (of all sorts); and a lack of the 'intellectual humility' examined in another recent post. We are all just working these things out, as we go along, so it takes some time and effort to 'get it right'. We'll see how it goes.

It takes a certain degree of intellectual yoga to be ready to take one's self in one's own hand. The easiest way to gain a foot hold on this ability is from having the oportunity to witness one's own self from a broken perspective. That is to say, you have to break your mold. How nature/genetics etc intends you to be vs how you are with a touch of brain damage.

Yall seem to want to bring value terms or connotations into influencing people to gain introspective. How can introspective be gained extrinsicly? Your premise is flawed at its foundation. You'll have to start all over again no matter how altruistic your goals.

Duality is really just another way to say, "the state of being one's own contrarian." This could be seen as the first step to gaining introspective and rationality but the second step is realizing this much is simply two dimensional thinking. There are far more dimensions to intellectually colonize than simply your first verse and its first reverse.

I heard it best from Henry Rollins in a little expiramental band with Andrew Weiss called Wartime on an album named Fast Food For Thought in the song named "Wartime"
"You gottah look the lie right in the eye
And not be afraid to see too clearly"

2:24
https://youtu.be/LZe65bI3dOk