The Uses of Not Knowing

Let's eavesdrop on Nietzsche for a moment:

"Forgetfulness is a property of all action."  The man of action is "without knowledge:  he forgets most things in order to do one, he is unjust to what his behind him, and only recognizes one law--the law of that which is to be."

True dat.  

If you work in an institution of some sort, institutional memory can inhibit your new idea.  But if you can discard the past, then you can do something new today.

In The Lonesome Dove Captain Call call knows about not knowing:  "It wasn't rational to think of driving cattle over eighty waterless miles, but he had learned in his years of [rangering] that things which seemed impossible often weren't.  They only became so if one thought about them too much so that fear took over."

Or as Mark Twain wrote, "To succeed in life you need two things: ignorance and confidence."

Or best of all, Han Solo's answer to C-3PO as they head straight into an asteroid field.  C-3PO cries "Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field is approximately 3,720 to 1!"

To which Han replies "Never tell me the odds."