A nice fellow with a quick mind here on steemit @son-of-satire has a contest asking what it means to be awake. I don't normally enter contests. The question itself however, is an interesting one.

What does it mean to be "awake"?

Now there is the obvious definition which is simply not to be in a state of sleep.

That is not what he is seeking. He is looking for that nebulous meaning that is used commonly today. "That person is awake.", "I'm woke", etc. It has a very different meaning than sleep. It is still dancing with that sleep and not sleep meaning but it is a metaphor.

At the shallowest of levels of meaning when it is used it often means to be willing to see the truth, even when it is uncomfortable. It means being willing to ask questions, even about things you believe strongly in. It means to seek the truth. It can lead to someone using a derogatory term such as "truther" to label you. I often wonder how they think that is a bad name... would you rather be called truther, or liar?

There is a danger of it being used in a not very positive way. Sometimes people will use it in an echo chamber type setting where they will consider people that agree with them to be "awake", and those that disagree to be "asleep". I personally view anyone with such shallow interpretations as actually not truly being "awake" in the respect we attempt to describe here.

There is a word that is not used that often in modern speech except perhaps when describing some role playing game character. That word is wisdom. What does it mean for a person to be wise?

I actually think in a way being awake can be just another way of saying the person is wise.

So what is wisdom? It is a far trickier thing to codify than intelligence. It is something we ourselves do not understand well enough to endow our attempts at AI with it. It is something that incredibly intelligent people can be completely bereft of.

This to me sounds like a trait of being "awake" as well. You can and are likely to encounter highly intelligent people that do not seem to be "awake". Why is that? An amount of stubbornness can accompany intelligence. The more intelligent a person is and the more other people have had others reinforce their intelligence ("Wow, you are smart!", "You're a genius", etc.) I have observed it can be more difficult for them to question their own current thoughts and beliefs, while simultaneously making them more prone to dismissing the ideas of others that don't mesh with theirs. This is not wise.

I therefore, currently believe (when I use the word belief it is not in a religious sense, my beliefs are constantly in flux as I get new information, and as I ponder my own mind) that an important step to being truly awake is being able to question and challenge yourself. I do not mean in a low self esteem type way such as saying "I'm stupid", or "I'm usually wrong" or anything like that. I am referring to understanding that everyone is frequently wrong, they will continue to be wrong about things, and that is okay. There are truly only two ways I can think of to learn new things at the moment.

First, we learn when we encounter information and ideas we've never encountered before. Second, and often ignored is that we learn when we are wrong, and we realize we are wrong. If we are unwilling to be wrong then we shut off one of the important avenues of learning.

So it is my current idea that wise people must be not only okay with being wrong, but embrace it when they are. When you can do this being wrong need not be a negative thing, but an opportunity. It is but one of the steps on the infinite path to truth. If you cannot be wrong do you truly think you can find truth?

I don't.

This leads me to debating with myself in my own head, and considering things I do. It leads me to interesting places.

I'd like to think I am awake. I try to be.

I avoid absolutes such as always, and never. I leave that possibility no matter how remote that ANY idea I currently have could be wrong.

This imparts some abilities that I believe those who are not awake lack.

When they would use absolutes and generalizations (things such as racism, and labels are forms of this) it immediately stands out, and the fact it is unflinching and so quick to judge makes it questionable.

So you get less likely to blindly follow appeals to emotion, and appeals to authority. You recognize the fallacy in the appeals to tradition, as appealing to those usually is done in a way indicating why something should not change.

One thing is certain everywhere you look in reality. Change.

Not liking changes, does not make them cease to exist.

For me being "awake" is about learning to process information in a less confining way. It is being willing to embrace the good and the bad, to acknowledge the things you like, and also acknowledge the things that make you uncomfortable rather than trying to mentally filter or ignore them.

That's about it.