Everyone who loves detective stories has certainly heard of Sherlock Holmes.

As one of the world’s most successful fictional investigators, this character famously observed, ‘”The world is full of obvious things which nobody ever notices.’”

How is it that we often miss what’s right in front of our noses? Obvious things escape our attention – our minds fool us into believing they’re too insignificant to make a difference. Instead, we see what we want to see.

The obvious things we miss are essentially the “aha” moments and the “of course” realizations we experience when we’re jarred back to our senses enough to notice them.

These conspicuous ideas are generally similar to the basics we learned in elementary school:

-Be kind

-Play fair

-Share what you have

-Tell the truth

-Say, “please” and “thank you”

-Play hard AND work hard

Try applying these simple, obvious things in your life. Don’t let your mind trick you into believing they’re too simplistic to be important. They are, in fact, the bedrock of a healthy, functioning society.

1. K. Chesterton once said, “Every high civilization decays by forgetting obvious things.”

Today’s “Peace of Wisdom” can be found when you DON’T forget the obvious.