IF ONLY WE KNEW (KNOWLEDGE IS POWER)

Have you ever wished you knew something before now? Have you ever imagined what you could have done with that knowledge and how much it would have helped if you knew then what you know now?

It was a bright sunny day, the weather was warm. Birds chirped and hummed, dogs barked, kids were playing outside and the car horns were so loud. The day just started, getting up from the bed was the hardest part (as usual) with a little yawn and stretching of arms and legs. Hhhmm, I finally dragged myself out of bed and luckily for me I wasn’t working today but I had some personal work to tidy up which demanded the same attention as being at work. I decided to take things gradually at my own pace, so first things first…prayed, brushed and made breakfast (yummy fried rice). The day kicked off really good; while cooking, a friend called and said she was coming over and 30mins later there was a knock on the door - twas her. You know how it is when ladies start gisting, we spend more time than expected to finish a task and that was exactly what happened to me.  I was with my laptop but was not really doing much (even though I had stuff to do) while she was surfing the web on hers. She looked up to me and said “what would we have done if there was nothing like the internet”? And then she asked again, what were we even doing back in the days without it and how did we cope? I chuckled and we both laughed over it, we spent a couple of hours more before she left.

After she was gone, I remembered what she said and it replayed in my head like a song left on repeat; I thought out loudly to myself… what would we have done without  cutting edge technological innovations, what would we have done without advanced means of communication? What would we have done without the easier and faster means of transportation? What would we have done without the improved medical facilities and scientific findings that have saved lives today? So many what would we have(s)? I could go on and on and on.

I remembered when I was a little child and it was a very big thing to have a telephone in your house where everyone in the family depended on that one telephone for communication with friends. When an elder one was on the phone, you’ll kiss talking with your friend goodbye till he/she was done with the call (which usually lasts for a long time). To reach a loved one who was outside the country, you’ll have to write long letters and include pictures which will take approximately 2-3 weeks to get to the person. A friend lost her mum so early because there was no functioning machine for dialysis at the moment. It took some people months to travel on sea to desired location, studying was difficult as students resorted to candles and lamps when there was no NEPA PHCN electricity. Working in a professional environment was so tedious with files and papers stacked up everywhere in the office. Cooking beans was annoying because you’ll have to wait a long time before it gets done (thank God for pressure cooker, lol). After pondering on all of these, I wondered how sweet life would have been then if we had what we have now. Probably my friend’s mum would have still been alive; we would have been able to avert some catastrophes that happened in those days. Sometimes in a relationship, you hear one of them say after a break up - I wish I knew then what I know now, maybe I would have treated him/her better and savoured what we shared.

From all I’ve said, I can only deduce that it all balls down to KNOWLEDGE. Some people say knowledge is power and I agree with that because with what you know, you have the power to accomplish great things. How much you know determines how much you can do. The difference between the best student in a class and the last student is knowledge gap. They learnt the same things but one went a step further to know more than what the teacher said. Through knowledge, the scientists and other great men were able to invent smart phones, the aeroplane, internet, light bulb, computers etc. They did not just stop at one information, they continuously improved and sought ways to make things better. For example the first computer was the big( box-like) desktop, then the desktop got a bit smaller, then the slimmer desktops, then the laptops, palm tops and now notepads. There was always an increase in knowledge and it was in a bid to outdo the past. If these things happened over a period of time progressively, I believe as individuals we can also get better if we make up our mind to increase in knowledge. Always work towards learning a new thing every day, don’t get comfortable with just enough. Cease every opportunity you get to acquire knowledge because you never know what that added knowledge can do for you. If we all work towards getting new ideas and outdoing our past, we will make our world a better place and create a better future for our children. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER…make use of it.