Stay Humble

Intended as a compliment, it immediately initiated a snort of disbelief. We are getting set up for a Super Ten session (when eight simply will not do) in the PowerBarn when she walked in to announce that it was time to go. The destination being a monthly trivia contest at the local craft ale house. As it was fairly obvious that I would not be attending, and that this represented my fourth event invitation, she says, to one of the other riders, ‘too bad for us because he knows everything.’

SNORT.

Channeling Sgt Schultz (of Hogan’s Heros fame) I quickly replied that “I know nothing about everything,’ thereby quickly returning the complimentary ball back to the court of the server.

My opponent in this tennis match of verbal upmanship is a lawyer. She is sharp. She does incredibly effective research almost always holding logical and legal serve. Tonight however she seems to be determined to compliment me, however backhanded the spin might be. I continue to argue in my defense, remembering that the defendant representing himself defends a fool, and make a final desperate volley, saying, “I also have chronic Dunning-Kroger disease.’

Suddenly the only sounds in the room are those emulating from bike wheels on rollers and The Kinks on the stereo. After a beat I scan the room and see blank stares, quizzical looks and questioning glares. “Is that like Lou Gehrig disease?’, “Is it treatable?’, “Are you sure, did you get a second opinion?”.

I look at her and ask if she knows of it. She flatly replies to the negative.

‘Dunning-Kruger is a cognitive bias so strong and ingrained in our self-assessment that it creates a false reality. We think we are so smart, know so much and are so full of knowledge and wisdom that there is no need to advance, to question or to be the slightest bit curious. About anything. We actually convince ourselves that we have reached the pinnacle of knowledge, when, in reality, we are too dumb to recognize how little we actually know. We don’t know that we don’t know. We are, to quote Frankenstein the Younger, idiots.’

Someone laughs, one is intrigued and probably went home after our session and Googled it, and she comments something about it sounding like a Republican issue, so we shouldn’t have to worry about getting it.

Early this morning, as we hammered our way through another set of Eights in the House of Mirth, I used, again, the ACQ as a measuring tool, suggesting that the two types of athletes, the over-achievers and their under achieving counterparts, all suffer from the glaring lack of tools to measure this important metric. The accurate assessment of perceived exertion is, after all, something valid and of high value. One can think he is a King when merely a pauper, or one can see herself as a handmaiden when truly a Queen. WHERE IS REALITY HIDING?

Dunning-Kruger says many overestimate. They, erroneously, consider their work, effort, responses and capacities to be way more than actual. Interestingly, these folks have a low ACQ because the athlete that refuses to face reality has little chance at change, a commodity necessary for improvement. Conversely, that athlete with a high ACQ is in a perfect position for growth as a direct result of their humility. They KNOW they can improve, they see their weakness and humanity, their failings and shortcomings and have made solemn vows to continually improve.

I ask the class who, what type, of teammate they would prefer, what type of partner, teacher, neighbor, leader or lover. Unanimous.

Stay humble my friends.