So, many years ago a boss drew out the following sketch on a piece of paper. To date, it was one of the most eye-opening lessons i’ve ever learned. So simple, yet so profound.
Here’s my version of the drawing:
So, this is representative of my life. To be honest, I’m probably being generous with myself cuz i’m easy like that. I bet the What I Don’t Know, I don’t know part is much more like 80%. But, thats me. You’ll have to figure out what your pie chart looks like on your own.
What I know: This is categories of things I know alot about. For me this includes sports, marketing, sales, the best way to eat muenster cheese, how to pitch a fastpitch softball, &why Florida is the greatest state in the US, just to name a few.
What I know I don’t know: This includes things like physics, how to follow manuals for putting stuff together, how to speak a foreign language and why anyone in their right mind does yoga.
What I don’t know I don’t know: Right now, i don’t know the answer to this. That’s the whole point. There’s a whole world out there of things I don’t even know exist. In the past, this list included what people eat in Africa (now, i know it’s pretty much the same stuff as here if you are in Capetown & it’s rice if you are in the middle of nowhere outskirts of Kenya), the sport of bullriding (now I know that it’s the coolest sport on earth & how we have the toughest athletes), social media (now I know that it exists & it’s important to business & it’s pretty darn amazing) or how they say goodbye at the end of yoga class (now I know that i don’t know this and really don’t want to know this b/c i hate yoga (see post from yesterday).
Here’s the point: Most of us Don’t know alot more than we do. Which is why learning & growing and gaining new experiences is important. Learning only makes me want to learn more. I just keep trying to carve into that What I Don’t Know I don’t know list so i can put it in one of the other 2 categories.
Personally, my biggest growth comes from travelling. There is a quote that says “Travel & You’ll Realize How Little You’ve Seen”.
That about sums it up. And thank you Mike for showing this chart to me some 8 years ago.
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