"To know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom." That's a quote by Charles Spurgeon. Spurgeon lived in the mid 1800's and was known as the "Prince of Preachers". He was a reformed Baptists, and many of his sermons are still around today.
A lot of people nowadays mistake knowledge for wisdom. They are really two different things... as Spurgeon is alluding to. Dictionary. com defines knowledge as: acquaintance with facts, truths or principles. Meanwhile, their definition of wisdom is: the quality or state of being wise. knowledge of what is true or right, coupled with just judgement and insight. Well, there is the catch... To have wisdom, you need insight and judgement. Have you ever met someone who is just book smart? They have a lot of knowledge, but no idea how to put it to good use! There are a lot of people like that in my profession. They have CFAs or MBA, sometimes both. Yet they can't pick a decent stock to save their life! There is one guy I know, that I would say is one of my wisest friends. The funny thing is he is not very knowledgeable in any given subject. Don't get me wrong, he has an Ivy league education... Harvard to be exact. He just doesn't have a lot of knowledge about any particular subject. What he does have is wisdom. He surrounds himself with knowledgeable people, and then fires off extremely insightful questions. He then takes the knowledge that he hears and puts it into action. He proves day in and day out that it is not what you know but who you know. I have never seen him treat anyone badly, and he makes everyone he meets feel smart by the questions he asks. He doesn't just ask questions about things he wants to know. No, he asks questions to see what you know. That way, if he ever needs your expertise, he has another person he can talk to. As you can guess, this man has lots of friends. They are friends with him because not only will he ask questions of them, but he will introduce them to others who have similar backgrounds to you. That way you make new smarter connections as well. He is a networking genius... and that, my friend, is a sign of wisdom in action. I have met a lot of people with specific knowledge in one field who try to make you feel stupid for not knowing what they know. This is the exact opposite of my friend. These people usually don't last long. They have specific knowledge, but they aren't interested in sharing it and building on it. Since that is the case, no one goes out of their way to share ideas with them either. To me, to have wisdom, you need to be open to new information (knowledge) and at the same time be happy to share the knowledge you already have. Human progress is a visual history of shared knowledge. Wisdom, or knowledge... which would you rather have? Being an analyst, I can tell you, knowledge is always available. You may have to dig deep to find it, but if there is a will there is a way. Meanwhile, wisdom comes with experience. It is easy to gather knowledge. But it takes time to see how to best put it to work. Oftentimes, people have knowledge. They just don't know what to do with it. That is where being wise really helps. Be like my friend. Be wise!
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