KNOW-L-EDGE By Peace CodyBanks

While we were toddlers, we were being referred to as babies because we knew so little compared to the information and experience that our older siblings had at the time. As we grew, our class changed, our friends were reshuffled, our language turned a new leaf and unconsciously our thinking experienced new leaps.

There’s a wise saying that goes thus “we will be the same in 5 years time as we are today except for 2 things, the people we meet and the books we read”. I believe this in every sense of the word. It is extremely dangerous to wish away our future, many of us simply admire role models from afar and would almost pray down the same gifts and talents they have to be bestowed upon us. Interestingly, such wishes do not go to where they are declared but to where they are attracted. The earth simply operates on laws. We have to sow the right knowledge-seed into our future to avoid harvesting regrets when we eventually arrive there.

Mike Murdock simply put it this way, he says “I can predict your future if I take a walk through your library”. Interestingly, we don’t have to carry hardcopy books to get ourselves equipped with that extra edge. We have audio books, e-books or better still the gift of Google. Many of us have pictures in our heads of the future we will like to arrive in but we have not gone after the ‘how’ to arrive at such. Every destination needs a map, it’s important to locate yours and thereafter carry along a walking Global Positioning System (GPS) in your mental faculty. Just as your radio station requires you to be at the right frequency to get the perfect waves needed for a clear signal, in the same manner, it is important for you to create a sharp signal through the collection of ideas from the knowledge you have acquired.

It is very common to find people in this generation saying that ‘they barely have time for themselves and when they do, there are lots of things piled up begging their attention’. A great mentor of mine was asked ‘what time do you ever get to read and he replied the same time you get to eat, I get to read’. If it is in your heart, you will find a way otherwise, you will find an excuse.

A couple of years back, I asked my father what he was doing at his spare time and he said ‘I simply travel around the world’ but really I knew he was always home during that period but he insisted that he toured the world and said in a convincing manner that he had visited many countries. Later on, he explained to me that whenever he reads, he mingles his mind with great people who are in different countries and in the process he gets exposed to great ideas as well as new cities.

Most parents run the rat race and hope their lives will be different for their kids. The last time they picked a book to read or tried to learn something new, happened to be when they were within the four corners of the walls of their University. When they graduated, they closed the curtains on learning. It is impossible to give what we do not have. We can only attract what we are not what we wish to become. Therefore, for those who would want their children to have a mind that is open to new ideas and adventurous with learning, it begins from you. Cultivate what you will like to harvest. Let the atmosphere be user-friendly with all manner of learning utensils.

KNOW-L-EDGE is the ‘KNOW’ing that ‘L’eaves you with an Extra ‘EDGE’.

Peace CodyBanks