Countless times, I’ve heard the popular expression. Countless times, this expression has been said to many people. But, not very many people commit time specifically to scrutinizing and ultimately correcting this expression. Probably because they believe the society is always right. Well, I don’t.
I’ve taken out time to assess this statement, and I’ve found it to be, in fact, not just untrue but also deceitful.
Before I take you through the process of mental adjustment, allow me to, foremost, tell you what exactly “information” is.
I’ve extracted two definitions from Oxford Dictionary. They capture all I hoped they would, and I’ll share them with you.
- That which resolves uncertainty; anything that answers the question of “what a given entity is”.
- Things that are or can be known about a given topic; communicable knowledge of something.
So, we can deduce from the above definitions that information is any stuff or knowledge about a particular thing. Right?
We can as well deduce that, according to the expression above, anyone who owns information or rather, anyone who knows a thing about another thing is powerful, right?
How?
People have been deceived into believing they’re better than some others, simply because they possess information that others don’t. Most frequently than not, these people sleep on the information, using it to make themselves feel egoistic. Because, let’s face it, the expression categorically, states that a person is powerful because he’s informed.
This implies that another person who isn’t as informed isn’t powerful. That’s where the lie originates.
Let’s get practical here.
Jimmy and Martin are both peasant farmers. Jimmy heard from a TV jingle that there’s a store next street that merchandizes farm tools that makes for easy cultivation and increased harvest. Jimmy got some cash, headed down to the store and bought a few of the advertized items. He took them home and stored them in his storeroom.
A year passed and it was harvest time. Jimmy had no idea about how to use the tools he purchased a year before. He resolved to harvesting how he always had.
Does Jimmy know something Martin doesn’t? Probably
Is Jimmy any better than Martin? Emphatically, NO!
Now, you’re beginning to see how untrue “information is power” is.
Here’s another instance:
Two students purchase a digital marketing course online. Student A makes good use of the course and six months later, he generates $1,500 in sales. Student B has ever since then been more indebted than he was. He intends to sell his course because he sees no use for it.
Here, we see a clear case of power coming through information. So, what made the difference? Both student A and B got the same course, right? From the same vendor, right? For the same amount, right? The same day, right?
So, why does student A get better and student B doesn’t? It’s a principle I call the “understand and implement” rule. This is the only condition when, truly, information is power. Indeed, both students got access to the same information. Student B probably read it better than student A. But lack of understanding and implementation ruined him.
A person who is informed but isn’t informed on how to implement his prior information isn’t informed at all. You may want to read that again.
In summary, information+understanding+implementation=power.
I’ll like to hear from you. What do you think about this piece? What are your questions? Let’s interact in the comment box.
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