Wednesday night my good pal Catie, shot me a text to invite me to join her in indulging in all there is to indulge in at Seffner’s finest, and probably one of the top 4 BBQ restaurants in the Tampa Bay Metro area, Hungry Harry’s. Well, being a fan of BBQ, especially Hungry Harry’s BBQ, there was absolutely no way for me to turn down the invite.

During the course of our over-indulgence we started conversing about how people learn what it is they know. Specifically how it is that some folks only believe what they’ve been taught, mostly by books, or in the majority of cases what has been spoon-fed to them in a manner that keeps them sheltered, if you will, from reality. It’s almost as if they’ve set up a barrier from that which is “real-life” and that which they choose to see as real-life: the text book version of life, or the version their parents have told them they need to be a part of.

This bothers me for many reasons. I don’t think it’s possible for someone to attain a significant amount of knowledge from books. Also, while I do believe it’s possible to gain a greater knowledge from other people than you might from books, I still do not believe that it’s possible for you to still gain a significant amount of knowledge from other people (teachers, pastors, celebrities, friends, family, etc.) either. I’m positive those avenues for learning do play a role in the formation of your mindset, but if those are the ONLY items that play a role in the formation of your mindset, then you’re not really in touch with reality. Lets face it, text books are outdated, furthermore, I know many college graduates who have told me that they abandoned the principals learned in their textbooks in favor of what actually works, which is in most cases the opposite of what the textbook said. Our world moves too fast for you to only live off of the words in a textbook, or the words of someone else.

I’ve even said the goal of this blog is for the reader to leave here thinking about something, even if your only thoughts are “Man, that guy is a complete idiot.” The reason I say that is because if that’s the only thought you leave here with then I hope that will get you thinking about why you thought that, which will get you thinking about why you think what you think…and do you see what I’m getting at? The underlying goal is to get you using that thing at the top of your skull in a healthy, productive manner. If you read something on here, and the first words out of your mouth, are “He’s right.” Then I’ve screwed up. You see, I believe that if ones words, whether those words be spoken or written are extremely powerful, obviously with power comes great influence which isn’t necessarily a bad thing unless that influence is the only influence that one has in their life. You’ve got to form your mindset, your knowledge of life on a variety of things including, but not limited to people, news, current events, life experiences (both of you and the people around you), your morals and ethics have to also play a role in this definition of what you “know.” You can’t hear something, read something, or see something and your first thought be “That’s right.” Inevitably you’re wrong!

So my challenge to you, my “call to action” is that you would think about all it is that you know, and think about ways that it can be impacted by recent events, even if those events do not seem to directly impact you. Now understand me folks, I’m not telling you to completely forget everything you’ve ever been taught by your textbooks, parents, pastors, teachers, friends and family. I’m merely suggesting that perhaps you could think about ways that you can challenge yourself to confirm that what you think you know is indeed what you really know.

I’m confident through the process you’re going to realize that you thought you knew, but you really had no idea.

Ex animo,

Will