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Do you feel like you know too much?

9K views 53 replies 39 participants last post by  bluesontuesday 
#1 ·
Sometimes when I feel low, I have this belief that I am too clever, knowledgeable and have contemplated too many deep thoughts to ever be truly happy. This is scary to me, it makes me feel trapped and my whole life feels shorter when I feel like this. Do any of you have this thing, and is it rational to have this belief?
 
#2 ·
I've has this idea.. at times, I guess. If anything I feel I know too much about cruelty and the physical realities of evil in humanity. But just in general I settle for the outlook that I don't know enough... That I'll never know enough. Like right now I'm a History and English major, and I'm overwhelmed by the fact that, as hard as I try, as much as I study, I feel I will never have a grasp on History or Literature. It's so broad, I will never know anything more than currents and some very specific details and guesses.

But to me, it's kind of beautiful sometimes. It's pretty amazing we live in a world that is too complex and multifaceted for any of us to ever fully comprehend.

As for whether your belief is rational or not... I don't know. I find it incorrect, but I know several people who believe the same. One was valedictorian of my high school. I definitely disagree with it, but I think it's more of a life outlook/attitude than it is anything.
 
#3 ·
I tend to feel that way, but it doesn't have anything to do with knowing that bad things can happen. That doesn't concern me. I mean, what would the good be without the bad?

When I feel like I'm too clever or I now too much, it's because I doubt almost everything I see, everything that is said, and, most importantly, every relationship I have. I don't think this is rational, now that I think about it, because I'm well aware of the fact that 'doubting' does not mean 'being clever'.

I'm going to have to think about this for some more time.
 
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#4 ·
I tend to feel that way, but it doesn't have anything to do with knowing that bad things can happen. That doesn't concern me. I mean, what would the good be without the bad?.
Sorry, just to clear up, I didn't mean that I was shocked that the world wasn't good good good all the time. I mean I'm a traumatized person and I've had too-close encounters with manifestations of evil in people. I understand bad things happen in the world, but it's a little sad when you recognize that bad things take hold of people, and that those bad things taking hold of people branches out to hurt so many others.

... Not to be melodramatic. I just wanted to clear that up. It's not just my knowledge that "bad things can happen" that makes me feel like I know too much about cruelty.
 
#9 ·
Sometimes when I'm alone, I would think that people know too little about what's going on in other people's minds but that's just my delusion. The fact is I'm no better than the people I'm thinking of.
 
#11 ·
I often feel too handsome, too rich, and too young to be retired and free to do whatever I want. It's a heavy burden.
 
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#16 ·
Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge, and how much happier that man is who believes his native town to be the world, than he who aspires to become greater than his nature will allow.
 
#22 ·
Not sure what I'd call it. I know more than is immediately or practically useful to me, but it's knowledge that I would consider valuable in its own right, despite my personal failure to leverage it in the real world. But it is really hard to find an application for it, especially when most other people don't really seem to be on the same page as me on many ideas, so... it does feel burdensome to be weighed down by what I know, but not be able to apply it.
 
#25 ·
No, I feel too much. This is worse.
 
#27 ·
Kind of, but the more you know the more you realise you don't know, ignorance is bliss. Sometimes when I go on existential slumps I feel like I know too much and become melancholic, when I'm healthy I am liberated by my knowledge and want to learn more about anything and everything.
 
#30 ·
I know what you mean. I've had that feeling in the past. It's a feeling of being old...like you've lived an entire lifetime (but you're 25) and seen too much evil and known too much horror to ever escape your jaded viewpoint again.

I no longer experience it. I have recently come to realize that all my false knowledge and shallow wisdom simply serve to inflate my pedantic ego...I'm dumb as the next man and can only offer something useful to myself.
 
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