Although the phrase ‘Knowledge is Power’ is often accredited to Thomas Jefferson, the expression actually started with Sir Frances Bacon who said “ipsa scientia potestas est” meaning ‘Knowledge Itself is Power’.
My personal view on this (and I know I’m taking this expression out of it’s original context) is that acquiring knowledge won’t create change for you.
We are surrounded by knowledge in the modern world and to the extreme since the internet hit the masses. There are blogs (case in point), books on all subjects, masterclasses, posts, talks, articles, magazines, thought leaders etc etc.
Having access to a global library of information from people of different backgrounds, expertise and ideas is beautiful. I myself am a huge bibliophile, with a huge collection of books both physical and digital covering topics from Neuroscience to a book from 1962 titled ‘A Book of Princesses’.
But reading or any knowledge acquisition will only get you so far if you truly want to change your lifestyle and make the shifts you’re wanting.
Did you know that only 10% of what we read is retained after 24 hours. This jumps to 50% if we discuss our learning and understanding and up to 75% if we practice by doing. It’s no coincidence based on these figures that our kids education has moved on from rote learning to more integrated learning models.
Creating change comes from taking action not filling your head with more things you’re not going to do.
Here’s my 3 favourite ways to implement ideas and take needle moving action:
Trying to change everything at the same time will lead to overwhelm and non-action. Choose one daily action that you will commit to each day that is going to support your mindset or lifestyle. This could be a daily meditation, tidying one small area of your home each day, reading a chapter of a book. Focus on one thing and build that practice or habit up over time before starting a new one.
It’s a known tendency of perfectionists, high achievers and master procrastinators to put off taking action until the settings are “perfect”. The stage is never going to be perfect for you, because you’ll always find a reason it’s not the right time, or the right place. Start where you are, with what you have and do what you can. Taking some action towards a goal is better than no action at all.
We all have that one big goal in our hearts, something we want to do or achieve for ourselves. Often we elevate this goal so high that it seems huge and therefore unobtainable. Bring your big goal back down to a human level. What are the steps to get there? How can you break down each of those steps again to smaller achievable goals?
Breaking goals down in this way uses a NLP technique called chunking down, a very useful way of changing the way we perceive our big visions. If you’d like a handy resource to do this just sign up to the Mindset Resource Library.