Self-Help Happiness Blog

Knowledge.  Understanding.  Wisdom.

Which is best to have?  What is the difference between them, anyway?

Knowledge is simple.  It is about facts and information, just observing what they are.

Understanding is a little deeper – it is about realizing what the information (the knowledge) means.

Wisdom is deeper still.  It is like understanding the understanding – how you should react to or feel about the information, now that you understand it.

EXAMPLE:

Knowledge: The government is creating seven new programs this year.

Understanding: Either the government will dip into my pockets now to pay for these new programs, or it will add to the national debt so that many years from now it won’t bother dipping into my pockets – it will just take my pants away.

Wisdom: I should fight the new government programs.  Or, I should live it up while I can, while I still have my pants. Or, I should seek how I can milk these programs to get my money back and earn interest so that one day (when my pants are taken away) I can buy them back.

Which brings me to what inspired this blog post…a quote from Malcolm Gladwell.

Since my brain really only works in the morning, I try to keep that time free for writing and thinking and don’t read any media at all until lunchtime, when I treat myself to The New York Times–the paper edition. At this point, I realize, I am almost a full 24 hours behind the news cycle. Is this is a problem? I have no idea. My brother, who is a teacher, always says that we place too much emphasis on the speed of knowledge acquistion, and not the quality of knowledge acquistion: I guess that means that the fact that I am still on Monday, when everyone else is on Tuesday, is okay.

These days, people rush to get the latest information.  They grab the knowledge.  But do they take the time to understand?  Or even more time to gain wisdom from it?  No, they are on to the next piece of information.

Once upon a time we revered our elders for their wisdom.  Now we tend to mock them for being behind the times.  My parents can’t use computers or any of the new-fangled gadgets.  They don’t have the information-overload that so impresses us in today’s “whiz kids”.

But is knowledge alone worth very much?  I think most people will agree that there is a hierarchy where wisdom is at the top, then understanding and finally knowledge (OK, finally would be ignorance).  But how important is it to seek wisdom, or is knowledge “good enough”?

What do you think?

This was passed on to me by my sister-in-law.  So much of it is just so true, great life lessons even for those of us who remember our school days as ancient history.

Bill Gates recently gave a speech at a High School about eleven (11) things they did not and will not learn in school.

Rule 1 : Life is not fair – get used to it!

Rule 2 : The world doesn’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3 : You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4 : If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss

Rule 5 : Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: They called it opportunity.

Rule 6 : If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7 : Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were
So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent’s generation, try delousing the closet in your own room..

Rule 8 : Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they’ll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. *This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9 : Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. *Do that on your own time.

Rule 10 : Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11 : Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one..

A father and his son, a young adult, were driving to the cottage. The father was worried, because his son had fallen into companionship with people who might lead him astray, and he was trying to help his son see that it was time for him to take his life a little more seriously.

“Aw, dad, I know you mean well, and I know I’m not really doing you proud, but I like to party. I’ll get on the right track some day. I don’t need to worry.”

They drove a little further, when suddenly the son said, “Hey dad, that was the turnoff for the cottage. You missed the turnoff.”

“I know,” said the father. “I think I’ll just keep driving this way for a while. I can always go back later to take the right road.”

A few more minutes – and a couple turnoffs – passed. The son began to think of the swimming he would miss if they arrived too late. “Dad, the farther you go down this road, the longer it will take to get back.”

The father replied, “That’s true. The further you go down the wrong track, the harder it is to get back. So when were you thinking of turning your life around to head down the right track?”

Where do you want to go? What do you want out of life? Most importantly, what are you waiting for?

Your neighbor’s vision is as true for him as your own vision is true for you.”

Miguel de Unamuno makes us think a bit about our natural self-righteousness. We tend to think that our visions are “truth”.

Truth is that when a rock hits your head, the skull cracks open. Vision is that hitting a rock against a head is wrong, because it is killing.

Yes, read that again. That is vision, not truth. In fact, most people accept that killing is right in some instances. Such as killing fellow creatures to eat them. Or killing tyrants who torture or kill others. We kill in war and sometimes as punishment. Some people agree with these actions; some disagree. That is because people have different visions.

We don’t have to agree with other people’s visions, but if we want to get along without a whole lot more killing, it sure would help if we respected other people’s visions a little more than we do now.

I want to share with you the message that was sent out today to subscribers of A Daily Dose of Happiness.  This is particularly timely because of the credit crunch that is making everyone suffer, but if you are a sensitive sort, you might not want to read any further; I am about to rain on most people’s parade. 

The credit crunch is a product of – let’s not mince words – greed.  All of our greed.  We wanted more, more, more (SFX: maniacal laughter in background).  Well, we got more, more, more than we could ever hope to throw away without even opening the excess packaging.  Sooner or later we have to pay for it.  Sooner or later has arrived.

Today’s Daily Dose of Happiness Message 

You know that whole debate about money buying happiness. It gets overly simplified, like far too many things.

I recall attending a Zig Ziglar seminar a few years ago. He said, “Money is not the most important thing in life, but it comes reasonably close to oxygen.”

His point is well taken, but how much oxygen do you need? There is a point at which more oxygen can be a life-saver. There is also a point where more oxygen becomes overkill.

Likewise with money. The first dollar you make this year will be very, very important for your happiness. At some point, when your basic needs are secured, the value of money starts falling dramatically. The 100,000th dollar you make this year will likely bring some extra momentary pleasure, but is unlikely to  actually make you happier.

The key is to find the point at which money stops making you happier. Any investment of additional time to earn more money will actually reduce your happiness (more money that does not add to your happiness, less time that would have).

Any further compromise of values or principles required to earn more money will likewise reduce your happiness (more money that does not add to your happiness, less integrity that would have).

Instead of accepting that we have to pay for all the excess of the past couple decades, we want the government (that’s us, remember?) to buy us even more excess.  Yes, we in the Western world really are embarassingly spoiled rich kids.  The problem, as any credit counselor can tell you, is that you cannot spend your way out of debt.   And as we dig our way into even greater debt, I just cannot see how that creates more happiness.  I fear we are collectively handing over the keys to what I call “The Merchants of Misery” in my book, Climb Your Stairway to Heaven.

From today’s Daily Dose of Happiness…

OWNERSHIP

Nothing is truly yours, except your own experiences.

Out here in farm country, I see a lot of signs that read, “This
land is our land; hands off government”. Of course, I know what they
mean, but the fact is that nobody owns the land. “ownership” is a
fairy tale we tell ourselves so that humans don’t harm each other
for use of things.

But the truth is, nobody own the land – not a grain of it. When my
very short tenure on this planet is through, the land will remain.

If I pass down my land to my daughters, someday they too will go. The
land will remain.

But our experiences never leave us. War. Floods. Meteor crashes.
Nothing can take away our experiences. And when we go, we take them
with us.

For my money (Can I call it “my”?), I would rather have dozens of
wonderful experiences that are all mine, than dozens of wonderful
things that never will be.

I came across this over at Live Life Abundantly, so I thought I would share it with you.

He who knows not,

and knows not that he knows not,

is a fool;

shun him.

He who knows not,

and knows that he knows not,

is a child,

teach him.

He who knows,

and knows not that he knows,

is asleep;

wake him.

He who knows,

and knows that he knows,

is wise;

follow him.

~Persian Proverb~
 

Over on my other blog, we are having a discussion of reputation and integrity.  Be the reputation you want to have.  It is a matter of integrity. 

But integrity is not just about reputation.  It is about being at one with yourself.  Wheneyour values and your actions are out of sync with each other, there is no way you can be happy.  Of course, we all have some misalignments when we do things that are not in sync with our values, but if you stay pretty close and generally can say tat you believe in the things you are doing, your path to happiness is much, much smoother. 

Good news? Bad news? It all depends on how you look at things.

Consider the following factual news that could send a pessimist around the bend and over the edge:

POVERTY: Almost half of the world’s population earns a below-average income.

ILLITERACY: If current trends continue, by 2022 almost every child born will be illiterate.

DISEASE: Fully 98 percent of people are at risk of getting cancer.

DEATH: By 2060, at current mortality rates, two out of every three people in the world will be dead.

See? It pays to be optimisitc, no matter how bleak the news might seem.

What would you do if you found a bag of $65,000?  Here’s what one honest lady did.