Knowledge

The term seem too easy, too basic, just because it’s a common term, but do you really know what it is and its proper application?

And please, when you try to define “knowledge” in your head differentiate it from “wisdom” for wisdom is the complicated version and the application of knowledge, another story by its self but will be integrated in this post together with sayings such as “knowledge is power”, the likes of “ignorance is bliss” and many more.

If you type the word “knowledge” in Google this is what appears:

“Facts, information, and skills acquired through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject.”

Key Notes:

1. Facts

The knowledge you gather for yourself and for your benefit must be facts, it must be the type of knowledge that will build and elevate you or make you stronger than yesterday and prepare you for the storms of tomorrow.

With that being said, I would like to exclude “gossip” as a branch of knowledge, yes I agree gossips can be a facts, but what are you going to do with that knowledge? So what if so n so slept with so n so??? That will never build you, it just wastes your time, unless you’re a lady and you have just heard that so n so are not in good terms in their relationship and you wanna go for the kill and snatch the nigga because he is loaded. Then there could be a loophole, but why don’t you try building your own financial health, so you don’t have to take crap from niggas to get through life, yes try that ladies. Then when you are stable as a person, you can find yourself some love.

There is a saying that goes:

“Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people”

Now y’all understand why I wanna exclude “gossip” as one of the types of knowledge one has to collect… This world has enough small minds.

2. Information

The gathering of knowledge is a process, you have to read books, newspapers, watch the news, talk to people, etc. So when you do go through the process of collecting knowledge, is it not enough to sit with it, now you have as raw as it is. You have to sit down and refine it. Discard the outdated, laugh and ignore the foolish, polish and store the good.

Have you heard on TV when scientist use the term “data collection”??? Yes let us all be scientist now, I’ll be Prof M Hlazo… Point is, when you are reading books and article, watching television and YouTube, that is your data collection stage. Then after you think and discard the nonsense, the stored data is your information, because you feel it will be useful to you at some point.

3. Skills acquired through experience or education

I know that once upon a time in history, a great miracle happened. A miracle were a full pack of knowledge was dished out for free. Well it was not just any kind of knowledge, it was the ripe kind, wisdom as it is famously known. This story is found in:

1 Kings 3:5 (KJV)

“5. In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night and God said: ‘ask what I shall give thee”

In reply to that, King Solomon asked for wisdom (knowledge) and he got it, just like that. Yep, “good old days right?”, but gone are those times.

So now what can one do to acquire the desired knowledge today? Thy shall read books (due to our times, computers, tablets and cell phones are included), thy shall listen to a person more experienced than thy [ “inyathi ibuzwa kwa baphambili” ] and thy shalt discuss among friends and debate knowledge and ideas [Not Boobs and Booze ].

The point is, you don’t get wiser by sitting around watching the beautiful sun set, you have to get it through experience or education.

As an example: If you see an electrical wire and you are not sure whether it’s live or not, you have to touch it so that it will electrocute the sh*t out of you, and there you go… Knowledge successfully downloaded… Now you know the wire is live and you would know how to behave around it. OR. Someone will have to educate you on using an ammeter for checking live wires. Both ways you have to put in the effort to get the knowledge. So get off your behind and go get the knowledge…

Speaking of electricity, here is some advice from one on the most celebrated Electrical Engineers in History:

“I did not fail! I just found ten thousand ways that won’t work”

-Thomas A. Adison

It’s like pulling a ‘push’ door, after you pull and it does not open, don’t feel embarrassed and consider that failure. You have just found a way how not to open that specific door [knowledge acquired].

So to me knowledge is the state of being aware, the more you are aware, I believe is the easier your life will be. Imagine if you were not aware there is something called a cell phone, if you were not aware there was a device that can bridge the communication distance to virtually 0km. You’d have to walk around the whole village/township to talk to people and communicate your message. From a health perspective that would be ideal, because you will be fit, but from time management’s perspective you will be wasting time, the time you could have spent with your loved ones.

There are a lot of things one can know in the world, I don’t think one man can know everything, but it won’t kill him to try. Once you know, the application of that knowledge is also important. Ok let me allow the greats to tell you that:

“Any fool can know. The point is to understand”

-Albert Einstein

“Today knowledge is power, it controls access to opportunities and advancement”

-Peter Drucker

What Einstein is saying is that don’t just fill up your mind with knowledge, try and understand what you have just downloaded, because if you understand the application becomes easy. Mr Drucker is just reminding us that we live in the information age…

“No thief, however skillful, can rob one of knowledge, and that is why knowledge is the best and safest treasure to acquire.”

-L. Frank Baum

There is a saying that “ignorance is bliss”, I don’t like it at all because what they don’t mention is that the path traveled by an ignorant man leads to death. Ok let me complicate it, there is a song by Cold Play Viva LA Vida:

“I used to rule the world,

Seas would rise when I gave the word,

Now in the morning I sleep alone,

Sweep the streets I used to own”.

The world is moving and it waits for no man, so its chilled you can be ignorant, let’s see how that unfolds. And let me leave it right there…

Let’s go get that knowledge…

-M Hlazo