Ignorance has an uncanny attribute of hiding in dark. It seldom announces itself. What goes on in your mind in your daily conversations? If it’s with a person you know, even before the conversation proceeds, you start predicting what the person is going to say. Fair enough, your mind has processed the information about what a person generally says and it helps you be in control of the decisions that you’ve to make. And also make them quicker.
When talking with strangers or doing business, this predicting talent of your mind only adds more value. It helps you save yourself from being taken advantage of, being a victim or even save your life at times.
But then arises the question, are you right every time about your predictions? How many times it has happened that the first few impressions of a person painted a certain picture in your mind and after a good number of interactions, you realized you were wrong? Either way, in a good or bad way?
And no surprises, you let it pass under the radar of ignorance. This does indicate that you weren’t right this time. You have encountered your ignorance. And how many times do you acknowledge it? Unsettling, isn’t it?
What do you lose?
To put it up in a sentence; every time you find yourself in an unknown space or painful experiences, virtually or physically, your ignorance was one of the pillars in doing so.
Want more surprises? At least the dragon of ignorance shows up its face when we go wrong in interactions with strangers and encounter pain. The times when we think we know enough about a person and start assuming instead of listening to what the person actually could be saying, we never encounter our ignorance immediately. But that day isn’t far away when the other one never says it and you never hear it. That’s ignorance gone too ahead.
This is also the case when you’ve ignored an aspect of that subject or that project for so long that it suddenly shows up its ugly face on the day of the result. Pro comment: It wasn’t as sudden as it seems. You have the biggest share in the situation you find yourself in.
What’s in it for you and them?
Now you know why your ignorance is a problem and spotting it is a challenging task. But then how does the situation change if you take a step to counter your ignorance? Or how do you even do it in the first place?
As Jordan Peterson states in his book 12 rules for life, “Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t.”
So true. The antidote to your ignorance is information. And this information hasn’t reached you because you haven’t looked for it. If you listen to what the other person has to say, there is a good possibility that you’ll encounter this new piece of information, adding it to your bank of wisdom.
This could be knowing a new investment opportunity, a new technique to use for your project or improve your skillset. But it is not limited only up to these. It also means that you have an opportunity of knowing even more about a person than you think you know.
This helps you from swaying away from the truth. You hear what they say and don’t what they don’t say. It’s not an overstatement to say that more than half of the problems we possess, begin with just this attenuation between the said and the heard.
On the other hand, it helps the other person get their share of wisdom from you. This is because you’ve taken a note of what they meant, you are reciprocating exactly about it. They are gaining 100% feedback for their statements, building on the relationship.
By just a simple act of careful listening, both parties get a window of opportunity for growth. And you know it, the best relationships help both sides grow and win.
What does it not mean?
The tricky part here is to observe the gap between blindly assimilating whatever is being said and keeping a window open for listening to what is being said. Our instincts, ability to predict based on small hints and flags have helped us evolve into the human beings we are. Of course, you can’t ignore them.
But maybe you can always keep that one portal open to each of your relationships at which you look carefully as if you don’t know what’s coming.
In the end…
Your ignorance isn’t a dimension in another world. It is just an unknown area that you haven’t explored. There is potential in the unknown, there’s growth in the unknown.
Start listening, counter ignorance, become wiser than you were yesterday.
Right blog at much needed time. I have a presentation and was ignoring few things, will work on it before the D-day.
Keep going. All the best