As a child, I always thought that “The More You Know” PSAs on cable were out for me because they only confirmed how much I didn’t know about the world. Know-it-all, 8-year-old me would feel blatant disrespect as the words “the more you know” slipped between the cunning lips of whatever A- or B-list celebrity who participated in such an unnecessary promotion. To say that the disrespect was blatant may seem like a bit of a stretch, but the phrase stirred such emotion in me because it left me on the edge of my seat clinging for more information—puzzled at the PSA, I’d ask the TV screen “The more you know, the what? What happens if you know more?”
I think it is safe to say that I know way more now than I did then, and these PSAs are not to thank for this. However, I always think about the geniuses before me, and those to come, who did and will know more than me, and I refuse to let this sit stoic as my reality. Knowledge is abundant and it exists for us to discover and expand on, so why would I ever stop at a 15 second PSA that only tells me so much about an infinite world?
Still, at my ripe age of 20, I have lots to learn about the world, but sometimes I fear this fact, because no matter the age, it will always be a fact. I will never have all the information or the answers, though I strive desperately for a utopia in which I do have these things. When this fear arises, I anxiously think about those PSAs and that conniving four-word phrase, and my confident self-esteem that fights to know it all squashes itself for the sake of mental relief. I relish this temporary tranquility before the urge to know more settles in, and then the battle begins again.
I say battle because it often feels like I am fighting myself on this matter—am I content with knowing what I know, or must I push myself to know more? The TV says I must push myself to know more, and so does education as well as work. Nonetheless, the 8-year-old Niomi, who exists somewhere in time, visits me in my thoughts and says, “I thought I knew enough.”
Then, the truth exposes itself: I do know enough, and so did my 8-year-old self for the time being. I know enough to keep me going, and I’ve known enough to keep me alive up until this point. In these moments of reflection, I realize that the more you know, is simply just the more you know. There are no hidden secrets, no tricks up the sleeve of knowledge, no puns or puzzles. There is only what you know in that moment, and that is the beauty of it all.
When the battle that I rabbit-holed down subsides, the damage reveals itself as resolution: the more you know is all there is to the game of knowledge and to the game of life.
