Merely knowing something is not enough to change your behavior. GI Joe Fallacy = the mistaken idea that “knowing” is enough to change your behavior, that knowing is half the battle. GI Joe Fallacy is a phrase that was coined by Laurie Santos who is a professor at Yale who is teaching the Science of Well-Being class I am taking. When I first heard this term it immediately registered with me, I thought yes, finally there’s a word for this fallacy. People often say “well, knowing is half the battle.” It’s not. It is one of two pieces, but they are not equal. The other alleged “half” is using that information and doing something with it. One thing I always say is knowledge is useless if you do nothing with it. This is why I take my sweet time reading books and applying the information I attain in my everyday life.
We all know that applying knowledge is way harder than learning knowledge. Learning is the easy part, applying is the harder part, that’s why the expression, if it was easy then everyone would do it exist, yet unlike knowing is half the battle, this expression is true. Since we all know this to be true why do we tell ourselves knowing is half the battle. We set ourselves up for disappointment when we know something and wonder why we aren’t getting any better. This applies to all aspects of life. Whether it’s a new skill such as playing the piano or playing basketball. We can all watch videos of people playing but we won’t improve. You will only improve when you go and apply what you learned; it is the act of doing that matters.
The number one place where we can see how false knowing is half the battle is, would be when it comes to our nutrition. How many of us know what will make us feel healthy and strong and how many of us always eat those things? I am guilty AF to knowing and not doing when it comes to food. I never feel guilty about missing the bulls-eye though because I understand it is hard not to succumb to temptation, I understand that knowing and doing are not equal parts to the equation, I understand that treating ourselves with compassion is how we begin to enact the knowledge. I also understand that I don’t need to do it perfectly to gain benefits and it’s the act of doing over and over again that will make it much better over time.
Next time you knock yourself for “knowing better” when you do something you feel you should have known not to, chill. Understand that knowing is not half the battle, it’s simply part of it. Now that you do know, you can figure out how to apply it, now that’s the upside. If you don’t know you have no chance, therefore knowing is key it simply is not half of the equation.