What do you need to be a philosopher? You discover that y...

What do you need to be a philosopher? You discover that you are a philosopher: it is not something you ever become.

Not a logical mind, not argumentative brio: philosophy is a passion. Discover this passion as a lover and witness of Socrates. Read the Platonic dialogues, Phaedrus, Phaedo, and the Apology, and you will fall in love with Socrates. You imbibe his frenzy, the madness of lover inspired by Aphrodite and Eros. You feel you can reach out and touch the feathers that grow again from the roots all over the surface of the soul to ascend to divine beauty.

To be a philosopher you need only three things. First, infinite intellectual eros: endless curiosity about everything. Second, the ability to pay attention: to be rapt by what is in front of you without seizing it yourself, the care of concentration - in the way you might look closely, without touching, at the green lacewing fly, overwintering silently on the kitchen wall. Third, acceptance of pathlessness (aporia): that there may be no solutions to questions, only the clarification of their statement. Eros, Attention, acceptance.

Gillian Rose, Paradiso