In this post, I’d like to talk about seven levels of knowledge you can go through and of course, it’ll take a lot of determination to get through all seven.
IGNORANCE: At this point, you really don’t know so much. You are at this stage where you are much unaware of what to do, why you should do it or what the implications are for the things you want to do. Ignorance has a brand value. You can bet you’ll pay for whatever you are ignorant about and for the most part, it is negative. When you have no idea what skills employers look out for in a job, you’ll definitely be in the running. You quite get the point.
KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION: You don’t necessarily have it clear what you want or where you want to be but you just take a leap, you dive into the unknown. You begin to garner as much facts and data through reading, listening, trainings and even observation.
UNDERSTANDING: Here you start connecting the dots. You begin to figure out the relationships between the facts and the final output. You have a grasp of how the things you’ve learned can affect the final output.
APPLICATION: This is the point so many things start making sense, the part where you start practicing all you’ve learned, the part where you fail and fail again. But you have to keep at it at, because it is in this process of applying what you’ve learned you’ll discover yourself, you’ll begin to unwrap that thing you are really great at and you’ll eventually produce results.
EXPERTISE: Here, you’ll cross the trial and error phase, your outcomes are consistent and your results are reliable. You can only get better and the stakes will be raised higher.
AUTHORITY: When you get to this point, you start focusing on giving back; you are recognized as a thought leader in your field, you start mentoring people, teaching and impacting others with the things you've learned.
GURU: Here you have foresight into the things to come. You anticipate future potentials and challenges by understanding the things happening around. You can start investing into corporations and communities at this point and you’ll also have a knack for discovering great talent.
To continually grow and improve in your life, you must continually ask yourself downright honest questions like:
What is my present level of knowledge; looking at the mental,spiritual,physical and social aspects of my life?
Where am I lacking and what are the things I need to do to get to the optimum level?
Do I fully understand my role in my family, workplace and the society?
Do I understand the role of others (family, neighbours ,the government and society) and the connections between our roles?
Do I understand the importance of my inputs to the society and its effects in the long run?
How often do I improve my wealth of knowledge with the aim of producing better results?
Do I consistently repeat what I have learnt to the point where I get desired results?
How much have I invested in others around me in terms of teaching and coaching to get them to do the right things?
How much have I inspired others to be the best and pursue excellence in all they do?
You cannot give what you do not have and so must continue learning. Learning is a lifelong process, to enable you embrace change, to the point of no return. A society can’t change until its members begin to change. The change you desire should start from you until the ripple spreads through your family, neighbours and transcends to the the entire world.
Get yourself learning something today.