The special knowledge club
I have special knowledge and I belong to the special knowledge club. Are you interested in knowing the special knowledge? You should be. It will change your life. It’s like a light switch in your brain. Suddenly everything makes sense. You’ll be healthier, better. You’ll get your life sorted and you’ll be supported by our loving family of special knowledge folk.
It starts with an idea, a profound idea that explains something we’ve all struggled with. But wait – and this is the really special part – not only does it solve that one problem, it can be applied to your whole life. It can and will revolutionise your world.
Finally.
It’s the truth you’ve been waiting for.
Does this sound familiar? It should. It’s a script we hear on repeat. The details vary but it’s always the same promise of a special knowledge that guarantees success. Every diet and fitness craze, self help book guru and proselytising religion promises to change your life and make everything alright. All the blogosphere with its 5 steps and 50 ways and twee pinterest insights taunt us by saying that it’s so easy to change your life with the application of some special knowledge and a bit of willpower.
Ever wondered what a consultant does? They go around selling that script. They provide solutions to a business problems – and sometimes very good ones – but successful consultants sell access to a special knowledge club for business where their knowledge is the first step toward making everything easier.
The solution to your problem will become obvious when you’re ready to make a decision about it, but that solution is only one of many options. It’s up to you to take a bit of care and pick one that matches your core desires and the context in which you find yourself. If any idea is sold to you as the start of a better life, you’re being invited to join a special knowledge club and that should raise an instant red flag.
“Are you interested in knowing the special knowledge? It can and will revolutionise your world.”
The special knowledge club isn’t a lie. There are some great special knowledges out there. It’s more like a misleading over sell.
We want our problems to go away. Of course we do. It would be SO nice not to have any for a change. People in special knowledge clubs legitimately want to help you and their earnestness can be compelling. Unfortunately,no piece of arcane knowledge, habit or life milestone, can provide a skeleton key to unlock all your problems and make everything great. Life keeps happening and problems never go away.
Never.
Yep, never.
Not to be pessimistic, but I’d like to pause on that thought for a second. There will never be a time in your life that you don’t have problems in some form. You will experience great and magnificent things but at the same time, there’ll be a bunch of not so great things going on that threaten to spoil it, if you let them.
You know what? That’s okay. Everybody’s life is like that, regardless of how it looks from the outside. Sometimes the balance goes the other way and you’ll experience terrible and heartbreaking things, but at the same time, there’ll be a bunch of comforts that will see you through, if you’re open to them.
Life keeps going and with it comes comes new joys and sorrows. Special knowledge may work for awhile but it won’t always fit your changing desires and life circumstances, even with the application of more dedication, faith or money.
Outsourcing to special knowledge means you don’t have to figure it out. I mean, humans have been around for awhile now. Surely someone has figured it out or maybe it’s been written in stone since the early days of mankind. Outsourcing to special knowledge means you don’t trust yourself to discover the answer. This erodes your intuition, decision-making and the ability for deep, motivational change.
Every life plots a slightly different path through an infinite variety. The moment we outsource that to someone else’s pre-packaged model, we start building lives that don’t fit us properly. Lots of people live lives that don’t really fit them, but they make do, sort of. Those that don’t, who find it too unbearable, get spat out the other side thinking something must be really wrong with them and maybe they weren’t good enough.
Well, maybe the special knowledge club wasn’t good enough. Or maybe it was just an idea, one solution to problem and there are lots of other options at your fingertips for figuring the rest out. Build a life that suits you, don’t settle for someone else’s.
“The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say”
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
Muchness 
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