If knowledge is power, knowing what we don't know is Wisdom

“A great book should leave with many experiences and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading” remarked American novelist W Styron. On this World Book day, i want to share the above thoughts on one such book i recently read and something that echoes the above quote. 

Think Again by Adam Grant (Organizational Psychologist)- recommended to me by one of Regional senior in my bank - is an exceptional book.It is an extremely important read for our times. Stay with me will come to it.

As the name suggests - and in the course of reading - the power in our human ability to step back and think again is where real intelligence lies. Intelligence is usually seen as the ability to think and learn, but in a rapidly changing world it might matter more that we can rethink and unlearn. This is a book which lets you think about what an individual can unlock if there is an ability to step back and clear the biases in the head, remove the wrong knowledge affecting our decisions and actions. As we think and talk, we often slip into the mindsets of three different professions - Preacher, Prosecutors, and Politicians. These are all different and distinct tools. Adam Grant explains “we go into preacher mode when our sacred beliefs are in jeopardy: we deliver sermons to protect and promote our ideals. We enter prosecutor mode when we recognise flaws in other people’s reasoning: we marshal arguments to prove them wrong and win our case. We shift into politician mode when we’re seeking to win over an audience: we campaign and lobby for the approval of our constituents. The risk is that we become so wrapped up in preaching that we’re right, prosecuting others who are wrong, and politicking for support that we don’t bother to rethink our own views” 

Now, i won’t get into details into the examples of all three that we see around us - i would leave upto reader’s wisdom - to understand those. The world is filled with people who - as i write - want to prove that they are right and others wrong. It is this sort of binary in thoughts which leads to fractured society and does not leave space for healthy debate because race is about who wins. We do not live in a world of simple solutions, we are a complex human beings and will always have complex solutions to our problems, so anyone giving simplistic answers is underprepared. Hence, everything cannot be Black and White, it is grey.

One of my favourite stories in the book is about Daryl - a black musician in America - who changed the thoughts of White supremacists including those in KKK (Foremost of White supremacists group). He did it by acknowledging the power of conversation, when he was driving a officer of KKK, this officer mentioned ingrained stereotypes about Black People - they had smaller brains, which made them unintelligent and a genetic predisposition toward violence. He challenged him to name people Black serial killers but he couldn’t. Daryl explains while we engage people with prejudice, we give up on opening their minds he says “we are living in space-age times, yet so many of thinking with stone age minds. Our ideology needs to catch up with to our technology.” (a bit more on it some other day). 

Think Again urges us to always think like a scientist because it is not just a “profession but a frame of mind”. Scientist is always in search of truth - a constant experiments to test hypotheses and discover knowledge. Question is, is it applicable to every profession? Yes. We are all allowed to do mistakes on our judgements, but not repeat it without incorporating it's learnings. We should re-adjust our thoughts, our assumptions, our conversations, and our minds open. That is a path of substantial and concrete learning. 

It is an extremely - i would term most - important skill to be aware of our Confirmation Bias (seeing what we expect to see) and desirability Bias (seeing what we want to see), you unlock your greatest potential when everything you see is not judged with pre-conceived notions. For example - in this disinformation world, once you say “i don’t what the truth is, so i don’t believe x or y source” that’s endgame because then “we find reasons to preach our faith more deeply, prosecute our case more passionately, and ride the tidal wave of our political party." 

Book is full of anecdotes where re-thinking helps teams, individuals, leaders, understand and deliver better. Reading has always influenced me in some way shape or form, and i have always stressed the importance of it so in this fast changing world to be of some meat, you need to keep learning and unlearning. This lessons in this book is more important than ever, that it is required reading for any one who want to build a culture of learning and exploration.

Finally, the quote again from the book "Our identities are open systems and so are our lives. We don't have to stay tethered to old images of where we want to go or who we want to be. The simplest way to start rethinking our options is to question what we do daily. It takes humility to reconsider our past commitments, doubt to question our present decisions, and curiosity to reimagine our future plans. What we discover along the way can free us from the shackles of our familiar surroundings and our former selves. Rethinking liberates us to do more than update our knowledge and opinions - it's a tool for leading a more fulfilling life"