As with all precious things that have no shortcuts, greatness is not something you can directly pursue, rather, it will ensue...

Down on the very bottom, your greatness will be firmly anchored to your constellation of curiosities.

Along that connection, as you search to address your curiosities, you will begin inheriting knowledge and wisdom.

Knowledge is not memorized formulas, like in ineffective schools, but more like programming, it is a fully functional ability, within you.

Wisdom, is the ability to magnificently solve problems you never encountered before, by subtle analogy to the great many things in your body of knowledge.

You may have knowledge of programming, but you need wisdom to consider if you want to host your program on servers.

Or on user’s desktop, or as a web extension, which does not cost you anything.

To give a more complex example, instead of writing your program, and hoping that it will be a success.

You start with something that is a success, as it fixes problems that people actually have, and then you create your program.

This is by not so subtle analogy to Sun Tzu’s “Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.”

Wisdom is not about strings of words, but trains of thoughts, the capacity to start an unending avalanche of valid and great ideas.

This cascade of fully activated functioning knowledge, observations, introspections, experiences, insights, highlights authentic truths…

Helps you keep moving in life, helps you achieve, solve, rise; or grow up.

From another perspective, we can’t grow up without wisdom, sitting around doing nothing, just causes aging…

And aging alone, absolutely and irrefutably, is not enough, to help a child grow into an adult.

Which brings us, to the third component of greatness, one that you almost imperceptibly copy, as you pursue knowledge and inherit wisdom.

To put it simply, as you listen to well narrated books created by great beings, who have their own combination of giants, upon whose shoulders they stand.

Their manner of thinking, perceiving, their values and mode of living, will to some considerable degree, copy onto you.

It is because Great Beings, are describing real lives, that were actually lived, that are, perfectly all too human.

Modes of living, that resulted in making permanent and positive, contributions to Human Kind, will copy onto you and all the others who are, listening.

Culture is just something that copies, so when you surround your self by the works of great beings…

You will simply, enter their culture.

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And that is almost it, it is Knowledge, Wisdom, and Class.

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I say almost, it is a rare creature, in deed, that gets a fair start in life.

Chances are that school has convinced you that you aren’t very smart, but your only failure was you not noticing that A students are brainlessly memorizing.

They don’t understand what they are quote - learning - unquote, they grasped some things, but they were likely of very low quality.

The kids that learn programming at home, and talk about it, and mess with it at school, show high quality knowledge.

Because they can re-invent a handful of useful applications, and yank themselves out of poverty by the time they graduate.

Again programming is a fantastic example, of real knowledge.

As opposed to largely fake knowledge, which is a medley of disconnected facts out of sequence and context.

This is done on purpose to you, teachers do that to make you memorize, because memorization for the duration of the tests, is largely indistinguishable from knowledge.

Teacher figures out that is they spoon feed you crap, you will freak out and start memorizing it, which will make it look like they are actually teaching.

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Your GPA is not real, the teachers are copying grades from your other classes, that is why you are a B student or C student in everything you do.

The principals often force teachers to only give A/s to one third of the class, and same for B/s and C/s – they want to look average, as not to stick out.

You were forced to think that your GPA reflects your intelligence, and perhaps your value as well, to shut up, and continue memorizing.

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Even if you are an A student, all you know is just shreds and patches, that will never connect.

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So there is one more thing, that comes after Knowledge, Wisdom, and Class.

And it has been practiced by every great being, from pre-socratics on up, no exceptions.

And that is, Self Education.

As with Knowledge, Wisdom, and Class, there is something you should know.

You can’t educate yourself when you are stressed out, you are an natural born composer, and master artist.

But you can’t open that ability, when you are to stressed out to feel music, and giggle at your paintings.

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This is why narrated books are important, because you need the serenity of an Adventurer, to hear your books.

Whether you take to the great trails like the Appalachian or Pacific Crest Trails, or find your own hiking adventures, it is up to you.

But please understand, Serenity is critical for learning – and you may need to fight for it.

Finally, growing up means growing all the way up, until you become a great being – greatness is not optional.