“Discretio” is a Latin word from which words such as discretion and discernment were coined from. It is “judgement of the truth and the ability to act appropriately according to that truth”. Simply put, it is the ability to understand a situation and make the best out of it.
It is this particular 9 letter word that declares a person wise. When I recall a particular person I consider wise or I hear people call wise, I notice that person always have the right answer to give or just know the right thing to do at the moment. Even in movies, just when it looks like the hero is cornered, he makes a certain move that makes me say “wow, that guy is bad!”
Just before that action, he/she has made a very conscious and deliberate choice. This blog post features all that lead to making that very choice.


Since discretio is about taking the best possible move, there is something I must do before I can apply it. I must sincerely and absolutely choose a life that seeks to be excellent and would have nothing less. It is a very crucial step that must be taken because without the desire for excellence I will lack the zest to go through the process of applying discretio whenever it is needed.
Having the desire to make the best out of it, define the situation. This may sound really stupid to note but I have observed that situations present themselves with surges of a kind of emotion: sometimes deep seething anger, sometimes sheer happiness et cetera. And this emotion becloud my thinking so much so that my interpretation of the situation as either an opportunity or a passing distraction would be utterly different from that of a friend who feels apathetic about the situation.
So when I am defining the situation, I should try my best to take an unbiased stance (and if possible, get the view of other people). And with the same factual sincerity, I search for every important fact that has the ability to affect my decision. Finding these facts would naturally lay out the different possible actions to me that can be taken.
Now I have various options presented to me but I’m faced with which to take. This is where I apply insight. Insight is about using the mind’s eye to see how every option would play out; and to see to the best of my ability the outcomes of every option presented to me. From this, I know the best option.
I play out the option that would best lead to my desired result and voila! I just applied discretion!
Caution: It will be a very slow and difficult process at first, but it is best to stick to it. With time I become better, quicker…and in no time would be called a sage!
Warning: It is very likely that I will stop at discernment, not taking steps further to discretion. Discernment is about being conscious of the various actions I can take; discretion is about choosing the best action to take – or to take none at all. For example, I can be discerning by understanding the various routes to wealth creation, both good and bad; but with discretion I choose the route that best supports my values and aspirations. To be discerning shows that I have understanding; but to display discretion shows that I have wisdom – for wisdom is when understanding meets knowledge and it is applied. With one of the three processes (knowledge; understanding; application) missing, wisdom is aborted.

Exercise: Now, identify a situation you’re going through right now. Play this post again, pausing whenever you need time to think, until you have gone through the whole process.
Do this for every situation you encounter until it becomes natural.
Declaration: I am bigger than any circumstance or challenge I face.

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