Limitless - Jim Kwik Page 0,37

you are trying.

Beth Comstock, former vice chair of General Electric, and her team learned this when the company had to scrap a new line of products in which it had invested. Comstock, author of Imagine It Forward: Courage, Creativity, and the Power of Change, often speaks on the ever-growing demand on businesses and the people within them to adapt and change faster.19 She reflects on how she and her team were able to look at the mistakes they made not as a failure, but as major learning lessons that led to the development of a new line that moved the company forward.20 Instead of dwelling on the mistakes, they asked themselves what they learned.

Here’s the truth: Mistakes don’t mean failure. Mistakes are a sign that you are trying something new. You might think you have to be perfect, but life is not about comparing yourself to anyone else; it’s about measuring yourself compared to who you were yesterday. When you learn from your mistakes, they have the power to turn you into something better than you were before.

Also, remember that you are not your mistakes. Making a mistake doesn’t mean anything about you as a person. It’s easy to jump to the conclusion that you’re inherently worthless, but you make mistakes; mistakes don’t make you. Place them under your feet and use them as stepping stones to rise to the next level. It’s not how we make mistakes, but how we deal with them that defines us.

New belief: There is no such thing as failure. Only failure to learn.

LIE NO. 4: KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

We’ve all heard the phrase “knowledge is power,” usually as a reason for learning, as if knowledge alone will give us power. You might have also heard this phrase used with the opposite intent: as a reason to withhold information or knowledge from another person, say, in a negotiation.

Although the phrase “knowledge is power” is commonly attributed to Sir Francis Bacon, the first known use of the exact wording was not penned until Thomas Hobbes, who acted as secretary to Bacon in his younger years, used the phrase scientia potentia est, Latin for “knowledge is power,” in Leviathan in 1651. He then expanded on the idea in De Corpore in 1655. Unfortunately, Hobbes’s original sentiments have been cut short over the years. In the original, Hobbes says: “The end of knowledge is power; and the use of theorems is for the construction of problems; and, lastly, the scope of all speculation is the performing of some action, or thing to be done.” [Emphasis added.]21

Put another way, knowledge is important, but it is “the performing of some action” that is required to make it powerful. This is where we get stuck as a culture. As discussed, we’re deluged with information on a daily basis. We have more access to knowledge than we have ever had in the history of humankind, and yet this glut of information makes it more and more difficult to act.

I used to believe this myth. When I was the “boy with the broken brain,” I wanted nothing more than to be able to learn like the rest of the kids in my classroom. But once I was able to do that, I quickly realized that possession of knowledge wasn’t going to differentiate me from the people around me—it was how I used my knowledge that would.

Here’s the truth: Knowledge is not power. It only has the potential to be power. You can read this book and learn everything in it, but if you don’t take it and apply the knowledge, it will be useless. All the books, podcasts, seminars, online programs, and inspiring social media posts in the world won’t work until you put your knowledge into action.

It’s easy to talk about what we learn, but I want to challenge you not to talk about it, but to show what you learned. It’s better well done than well said. Don’t promise, prove. Your results will speak for themselves.

New belief: Knowledge × Action = Power

LIE NO. 5: LEARNING NEW THINGS IS VERY DIFFICULT

When we hear the word learning, we usually think of school. Few of us have fond memories of school. Even if we did well academically, school is typically a place associated with the growing pains of youth, where we felt romantic love for the first time (and probably rejection), and where we experienced crushing boredom. For those of us who struggled in school, the added emotions of shame, doubt, and the ever-present feeling