When you’re stuck, the go-to solution is “more information”.
Read more books, consume more podcasts, more online courses, find more data, crunch more numbers.
The more informed, the better the position to do something about it.
In theory.
What really happens is you become an information glutton.
Consuming more, more, and more…
And doing less and less.
There’s a flaw in this logic, which tells us that knowing comes before acting.
You’ll never know enough.
The world is infinite and produces infinite resistance to our wills.
Our intellects are not infinite.
Waiting to “know enough” is the same thing as doing nothing.
One of the things I love best about Aristotle’s ethics is that he didn’t sit around making theories about universal moral principles.
He looked at what made up a good life for real people.
The best kind of life makes use of our creative vital powers.
You don’t have to know it all. You don’t make it your life’s quest to hoard knowledge like a dragon sitting on gold.
You act best you can in the situation, based on what you already know.
If you’re stuck, the best thing to do is take the next step.
And if you don’t know what to do?
Find the obstacle creating the friction.
Get rid of it.
Are you stuck? Let me know.
Matt Perryman
https://matts.email