S4 Ep20: Why is it Healthy and Empowering to Admit “I Don’t Know?”
Not knowing things is how you grow and evolve
Multiple forces are pushing the idea that “I don’t know” makes you weak, makes you inferior, and sets you up to fail. They don’t know something? Look how inferior they are because they don’t know and we do.
This is utterly backward, however. Scientific curiosity is born of looking at something, saying “I don’t know but desire to learn.” The unknown is where great discoveries abound.
Seeking answers when you don’t know is how we got to the world we’re at today.
Empowering learning and growth
All learning of real knowledge begins with recognizing that there are things you don’t know. More than that, there are things you don’t know but desire to know. Thus, you start to do what you can to learn.
“I don’t know” leads you to question things and empowers you to seek answers. Social studies, advanced math, and science in school start to address this and teach you. However, it doesn’t address the question “Who am I?”
That is a self-directed matter. Who you are can be known to you, and you alone. That’s because you’re the only one in your head, heart, and soul. Nobody but you can know you, as such. Self-awareness 101.
Working with and from “I don’t know” makes you stronger, not weaker
The truth is that admitting “I don’t know” makes you strong. Not knowing things doesn’t make you lesser, unworthy, or defective. Truth is, it makes you human.
“I don’t know” applies to everyone everywhere. That doesn’t make you lesser, or weaker. It empowers you to grow, learn, and evolve.
Because nobody knows everything about anything - but human beings are inherently curious and seek to learn, grow, and evolve - the starting point is inevitably “I don’t know”. That’s why “I don’t know” is so damned healthy. It is from not knowing that we seek to gain more knowledge.
I don’t know, because there is always something to be learned
No matter what scale you measure life, the Universe, and everything on, there is always something to be learned.
When you are taught to fear “I don’t know”, you are disempowered. You remain sheltered, ignorant, and at the mercy of the people telling you not knowing makes you weak. Nothing could be further from the truth.
There will always be things to be learned. Knowledge to be gained. That’s why it’s healthy to admit “I don’t know.” Without that admittance, how else can you grow, evolve, and expand what you know? How else can you know who you are and change if that isn’t who you desire to be?
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Is there something you have always desired to know? Take steps to learn it.
Watch the YouTube videos, visit the website, read the blogs, buy the book, and/or experiment with the practice. Whatever it is, make the time and the effort to learn it, however best you learn things (reading, watching, listening, doing, and so on).
Don’t put this off until tomorrow. After you finish listening to this podcast, take something you don’t know – but have always desired to know – and make the effort to learn or learn about it.
Blogs: titaniumdon.com and mjblehart.medium.com
Original cover art artist Fe Mahoney: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TaliasInspirations