We are familiar with the saying "ignorance is bliss". We are also familiar with the surface meaning (note "surface meaning") that not having knowledge of something is a good thing due to its lack of disturbance to the mind. I have thought of a meaning of this phrase from a different perspective. Probably this is the actual inner meaning to the phrase. All right here goes Thana's perspective on this.



Let me inject a saying upon this saying. We know the phrase "the more we know, the more we realise that we don't know". Based on this phrase, we know that the more we learn new things, the more we realise that we don't know some things. This is simply because whenever we learn something new, we come to know that that there is much more to learn. This is very much akin to an iceberg. By looking at the tip of an iceberg, we realise that there is so much more to be seen of the iceberg.

Coming back to our original phrase, by knowing something new, we come to know how ignorant we are of the depth of that subject. Hence, "ignorance is bliss" does not refer to our lack of knowledge. It ironically refers to our awareness of ignorance resulting from the knowledge of something. By having this awareness, we achieve the good feeling of bliss. Henceforth we have the meaningful phrase "ignorance is bliss".

I hope the knowledge of this phrase from my perspective has brought bliss, if you know what I mean.