The More You Know

Now, I don't claim that I know everything. In fact, there's far too much that I don't know a single thing about. However, there are some things that I can definitively say that I know quite a bit about. In Swedish, I could very easily say that I "kan" some subjects.

It does not make sense to me when people try to play the 'who knows more' game. No one can or should play that game because everyone knows something different. No one has studied everything and knows everything about the world. No one has a perfect knowledge.

The thing that frustrates me the most is when someone picks at one particular thing and says that if you do not know that one thing, you know less than them, and they're your mental superior. Be warned about this, if you start the conversation with trying to prove just how much you know about topic X, I'll most likely agree with you. If you then try to show how much smarter you are than me about topic X, that's when it gets personal. You started it. You were the one that started the muscle flexing contest. You were the one that started to insult my education. You were the one calling me stupid. Don't be surprised when I try to defend myself. When push comes to shove, don't act offended after focusing how much you're an expert on X that I try to prove just how uneducated you are about topic Y. Remember, you started it.

There's never a winner, no one can ever say that they know everything, but if you start the peeing contest, know what you're starting and be prepared to face the music. 

As a kind reminder, I've spent the past 20+ years trying to become as smart as I could. There were some years that were better than others, and some classes that were entire failures, but as a general rule of thumb, I've done some serious work on trying to learn as much as I could about everything I could, and when I try, I get above average scores. It's the one thing that I'm proud about and also sensitive about. If you ever want to get me fired up and see my bad side in a split second, tell me how stupid and uneducated you think I am. I might be wrong, I might know less than you in every single subject, but there's no way that I'm going to sit by and let you insult me and 20 years of studying and work without saying a single word.