Boiled Frog
There's a metaphor out there about boiling a frog. The basic idea is, if you put a frog in boiling water it will jump out immediately, but if you put it in room temperature water and then slowly increase the temperature, it won't jump out and won't notice its peril until it's too late. This metaphor is often used to show how people are complacent as their rights are taken away until it's too late and they live under a murderous dictatorship. But it definitely can be used as a metaphor for other things.
I have three college degrees in English and Creative Writing, so I am very knowledgable about story-telling, literature, and language. Not only that, but I love learning in general, and try to learn something new everyday, so I have lots of random and interesting bits of knowledge floating in my brain. I'm pretty smart, if I do say so myself (though I'm ditzy and dumb in other ways).
When I start talking about things I'm interested in, or mention something cool I know, and get "I didn't know that" looks from my coworkers and family, it throws me a loop because doesn't everyone know the things I know? And then I remember that no, not everyone knows what I know. I have a lot of very specialized knowledge from seven years of schooling. But I don't feel any smarter or more knowledgable than I was before I started college. I'm the boiled frog, soaking in academia and learning for so long that I didn't realize when I became smarter than the average bear1.
A phrase my dad uses a lot↩