52 WEEKS
Week 1 1— Ignorance is our Friend
I love my ignorance. It’s one of my favorite things.
It’s my sense of discovery. My hope for the future.
The problem is, ignorance gets a bad rap.
What’s the first word we think of when we hear the word “ignorant”?
We all thought stupid, didn’t we?
They’re two completely different things! Stupidity is the “inability to effectively take in information”
Ignorance is just the lack of information.
Bill Nye the Science Guy is ignorant about… what it’s like to be a single mother in Ethiopia. That does not make him stupid.
Most of us are ignorant of how a jet engine works. That doesn’t make us stupid, either.
I think after “I Love You,” the three most powerful words in the English language are, “I Don’t Know.”
As in, I’m sorry, I don’t have enough information at this time to give you an accurate opinion. Oh, sure, I have an impression I’d be happy to share with you, but I DON’T KNOW.
The more we say I don’t know, the more we start to know.
Of course some people would rather DIE than admit they were ignorant about anything.
They’d never let a little thing like ‘lack of information’ keep them from having an opinion.
And it’s such a waste. Nowadays, the cure for ignorance is a mouse click away.
In the olden days, if we wanted to know how a jet engine worked, we had to have an encyclopedia or go to the library.
Now it’s just click/click and there’s an animated video that explains how a jet engine works.
Poof! No more ignorance.
I notice that some people when they get older (and even some younger people) just get bored with life.
They start feeling like they’ve seen it all, done it all a million times, know all about that…
And they’re like, what’s for dessert?
Well, ignorance can help with that. Because ignorance is our friend.
A great friend who brings us something new to learn every day. Something we didn’t know yesterday that can make our life better, and more exciting, today.
If we’re bored with life, it’s not really life we’re bored with, it’s what we’re doing with it.
We’re bored with what we know. Well, ignorance is what we don’t know!
In fact, ignorance would like to inform ALL of us that we haven’t seen it all, or done it all, and we damn well don’t know it all.
You could fill the oceans with what I don’t know.
But if we ever DO find ourselves stuck in a rut, bored with life, then it might be time to make some changes.
Treat being stuck in a rut the same as we would any other problem.
Talk with people about it. Identify the part of our life that feels like a rut, and take action.
Learn some new things. Try some new things.
Out with the old, in with the new!
Less whine. More DO.
Just remember, if we’re unhappy with what we know, maybe the answer lies in what we don’t know.
AFTERTHOUGHT
— Through it all, ignorance will be there for us, like a dear, trusted friend. Because no matter how long we live, ignorance… will never EVER leave us.