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How Unlearning Changed My Life
“The most valuable skill we can learn in our lives is to unlearn what is untrue.” ― Antisthenes
The word ‘unlearning’ might come across as alien to some. The first time I came across the concept, I was appalled (a few years ago now). By this point, my life had centered around the idea of acquiring knowledge, being a knowledge-sponge soaking up as much information as I could. It wasn’t that the information I was learning was useful, just that it would add to my mental library. People I talked to would tell me how much they admired how I seemed to know “something about everything.” Others would say to me that my being a “know-it-all” was their least desired characteristic in me.
However, everything changed when I came across ‘unlearning.’
The quote that I placed as my subtitle by Antisthenes…
“The most valuable skill we can learn in our lives is to unlearn what is untrue.”
…hit me like a freight train. It spoke to me on a level that — at the time — I didn’t even realize was there. It made me question everything I thought I knew, naturally. The concept seemed so foreign to me at first, but then I realized it’s something I believe we all do in our lives, we just don’t observe it as ‘unlearning.’
