For a while, I believed I had invented a saying: “Everything you don’t know is a kick in the arse you’ll get tomorrow.” Then I discovered that very similar expressions already existed. A version about words we have not learned also appears in a text about Father Lorenzo Milani. I do not know the precise origin of the wording I used, and I would rather leave that question open than name an author on the strength of hearsay. (A variant reported by LA7 — in Italian)
That does not change why the saying matters to me. It is not elegant. It is blunt and exaggerated, and perhaps that is exactly why it stays with you. It carries a warning I consider important: something we do not know today may become something we pay for tomorrow.
I do not mean that people should be punished for not knowing. I am thinking of those occasions when a question, a little attention or some extra knowledge might have spared us a difficulty. The kick comes from reality, arriving without stopping to ask whether we are ready.
The bill comes later
Sometimes we do not learn something because it seems far removed from our lives. We do not need it now, it will not be in the exam, it has nothing to do with the job we would like. So we let it pass, as though anything without an immediate benefit were a waste of time.
Then something changes. We are given a task, find ourselves alone with a problem or have to make sense of an unfamiliar situation. That is when a gap we had never noticed becomes very real. It had not disappeared: it simply had not sent us the bill yet.
I imagine someone starting a job and half-listening to an explanation because it all seems easy. They do not ask what a particular check is for, skip a step and only realise their mistake when they have to do the whole thing again. They were trying to avoid a small effort; the effort that follows is much greater. Time spent understanding is not necessarily time taken away from doing: often, it is what allows us to do things better.
Knowing gives us more freedom
For me, knowledge also means having a little more room to choose. If I do not understand the words someone uses to present a decision, I may end up simply nodding. If I understand at least the problem, I can ask questions, request explanations and notice that something is missing.
That does not mean becoming an expert in everything or distrusting everyone. We will always need other people’s skills. But there is a difference between trusting someone while understanding why we do so and handing over every decision simply because we feel incapable of understanding it.
Learning to express ourselves matters too. Having the words to say what we want, what we do not understand and what seems unfair allows us to take part in our own lives rather than silently endure them. Having something to say is not enough: we also need to find a way to say it.
Knowledge is not there to make us feel superior. It helps us become less defenceless. And anyone who knows something should also use it to give the people around them more freedom, not to make them feel small.
The question we are embarrassed to ask
One of the things I find saddest is watching someone pretend to understand. Perhaps they nod, smile or repeat a word they have heard other people use. They do not want to look unprepared, so they give up the very chance to prepare themselves.
Saying “I don’t know” can feel uncomfortable. But it opens a door. “Could you explain it to me?” opens another. Pretending to know risks closing both: other people assume we do not need help, and we are left alone with whatever we have failed to understand.
I would rather hear a simple question at the right moment than see someone put on a show of confidence with nothing behind it. At work, at school and at home, some mistakes begin long before we actually make them: they begin when we decide that looking good matters more than understanding.
And the responsibility does not lie only with the person who needs to ask. Teachers, managers and parents must make it possible to ask that question. If every uncertainty is met with laughter or a reprimand, we are teaching people to hide their doubts, not to work through them.
Books are not the only teachers
When I talk about knowledge, I do not mean only academic qualifications. Someone may have studied a great deal and still be unable to listen to anyone. Someone else may have had little formal schooling yet know a trade, understand people and handle difficult situations with good judgement.
School matters, but it does not contain everything there is to learn. We learn by watching someone work well, asking why they do things a certain way, trying patiently and accepting a correction. And we learn from people younger than ourselves too.
Some things do not seem worth learning until we need to know them. A book may give us words for a feeling we could not explain. A language may allow us to get to know someone. A story from far away may help us see what is right in front of us differently.
I would not want to reduce learning to insurance against being taken advantage of. Learning can also be a pleasure, a discovery, a way of expanding our lives. Not everything worthwhile has to help us earn something or avoid harm straight away.
We need not make every mistake ourselves
There is another kind of knowledge we often neglect: what other people’s experience can teach us. We listen to a story and think it will not happen to us, that our situation is different, that we will handle things better.
Sometimes that is true: situations are not all alike. But those differences should not stop us learning. We do not need to repeat every mistake to understand that it can have consequences. We can listen to how it began, what went unnoticed and which decision might have changed what followed.
This applies to relationships too. By listening to someone, we can recognise how painful it is to be taken for granted. We do not need to lose a person before we begin asking how they are. And we need not wait for an argument before learning to say clearly what we need.
Of course, experience is not a law to impose on others. A father can share what he has come to understand, but cannot demand that his children live the same life. I would like to offer tools, not make their choices for them. Even someone giving advice must remember that they still have things to learn.
Nobody can know everything
Taken literally, my saying would be unfair. There are infinitely many things we do not know, and we do not have time to learn them all. Not every gap will become a problem, and no amount of preparation can protect us from every mistake or sorrow.
Nor has everyone had the same opportunities to study, people willing to explain things or spare time to explore a subject. Not knowing something does not diminish a person’s worth. And if someone takes advantage of their inexperience, responsibility for the deception remains with the person who deceives.
The distinction that matters to me is between having a gap in our knowledge and deciding not to look at it. I can be ignorant of many things and remain curious. Or I can know a great deal and stop listening. In the second case, the very confidence that I am well prepared may make me less attentive.
So, as I understand it, the saying does not ask us to live on constant alert or study without ever resting. It asks us not to dismiss every explanation with “I’ll never need that”, and to pay particular attention to the things our choices depend on. We cannot prepare for everything. But we can avoid making a habit of inattention and hiding behind the belief that we already know enough.
What I would like to leave my children
My children, when you come across something you do not understand, do not immediately assume you are incapable of understanding it. Pause, ask a question, find someone who can explain. Sometimes something that looks difficult simply needs to be approached one step at a time.
Do not be ashamed of learning late, starting again or being taught something by someone younger. And do not confuse a confident speaker with someone who truly knows their subject. Listen, check when you need to and give yourselves the freedom to change your minds.
I would like you to study to create possibilities for yourselves, not just to get a mark. To learn a trade without losing your curiosity. To know how to ask for help and, when you are the ones who know something, to explain it without belittling the person listening.
And when, despite everything, life does teach you one of those painful lessons, do not use it to convince yourselves that you are stupid or incapable. Try to understand what happened, what you could have known and what was beyond your control. Learning from a mistake does not mean condemning yourselves for making it.
I cannot spare you every kick life may deal you. But I can encourage you not to face things unprepared when you had the chance to learn about them. And I can remind you that asking today is often easier than having to put things right tomorrow.
That is why the saying still feels like mine, even though I cannot claim to have invented it: not as a claim to authorship, but as a thought to pass on. Above all, I would like to pass on a desire to understand, rather than an insistence on being right.
Papy