A Learning a Day

This week’s book learning is from ‘Screw It, Let’s Do it’ by Richard Branson.

When Richard Branson was a young entrepreneur getting started with Virgin Music, he flew to Japan and set up numerous meetings with the big shots in the media industry. He had some vague ideas of a joint venture but really, he was just a broke man with some outrageous ideas. Yet, he found himself being listened to and being treated very courteously and patiently.

That experience had a deep impact on him and he decided that he would be as polite and courteous to all those around him. This resolution was tested when he was on his way to a meeting in a taxi with a very chatty taxi driver.

‘Oy I know you. You’re that Dick Branson who runs that record label.’

Branson smiled, hoping he would shut up. But he went on and said he was also a drummer in a band and asked if he could play a demo tape. Branson’s heart sank but he didn’t want to be rude so he replied with a ‘That will be lovely’.

And just as they were getting to the end of the trip, the cabbie put on the tape and Branson then heard the words ‘I can feel it coming in the air tonight.’

That’s when the cabbie got out laughing like mad. He was the one and only Phil Collins..

A bad mood, a bad day, work, busy-ness and other things seem to get in the way of us being the best we can be.

‘You meet the same people on the way down as you met on your way up. So, treat them well’ is a quote I really like.

Branson’s story reminded me of that wise quote..

Here’s to being polite and kind to everyone we meet this week!

My (really cool) guitar teacher received a whole bunch of emails this week. Following my months of personal spring cleaning, I was feeling the effects of spring this week. And that flowed to my guitar learning as I sent him email after email speaking of songs I really wanted to learn. The excitement was palpable. And I kept checking out song lessons online to figure out if songs were easy or difficult.

He joked towards the end of the lesson that after all those emails, he thought he’d better give me lots to do this week or he’d lose me to online lessons.

My immediate response was that that would not happen in the near future. I explained to him that I’m one of those people that gets the maximum out of learning when a teacher is involved – it comes with my low attention span. I’ve written about why I don’t even attempt to be self taught these days.

That response did get me thinking though. I found myself reflecting on a normal occurrence when I’m home. One of the most important parts of my trip is to make time to visit/speak to my secondary school teachers.

And now I fully understand why. In my case, my teachers have made all the difference in the world. I’ve been fortunate to be blessed with many great ones – starting with my mom and family, moving on to my teachers in school, mentors in my workplace and close friends all through. All of the good that exists within me exists because of these individuals who have taken time to teach me things. And I wouldn’t be anywhere without them. Just a very energetic kid with a very low attention span. 

Online education is a big thing these days. Many teachers have felt threatened by this new unknown monster. My view on this is simple – it will likely work very well as an accompaniment to learning but, at the end of the day, all those kids closer to the attention deficit side of the spectrum (half the population one would think..) would still need that guiding hand especially when they are young. And if you’re a good teacher you’re invaluable anyway. (The bad ones have reasons to be worried.)

It takes a long long time to learn how to learn. I think of it as developing an approach to learning. And especially for someone like me, I really mean the LONG. It’s a learned trait and is not a natural one and it is one I can apply with lots of effort to things that are really important. It has a draining effect at the end of the day as such focus/attention to detail while learning is not natural. It takes work.

It becomes very obvious when I’m working on learning something on the side. My attention just doesn’t hold. I lose interest very quickly. And this has happened twice with the guitar. It’s only over time I’ve learnt that the teacher makes all the difference in the world. When I think of tennis, I think of Chris and all of what he’s taught me. It’s similar with the guitar. A couple of years down the line, I’ll probably be good enough to pick stuff up on the guitar from a video online. It’s still a long way away..

It’s liberating when you learn these things about yourself. At least in my case, I used to look around at friends of mine who seemed to have nailed approach much much earlier in life and I used to find myself questioning my intelligence and ability to learn something or anything. It’s only over time that I’ve learnt that I’ve got a different style..

So, I’d like to take this moment and thank all of those people who’ve been a part of my life and who’ve taught me so many wonderful lessons. You might have done it as a teacher, a mentor, a colleague or as a friend and you might have done it intentionally or even unintentionally but you’ve had impact. I don’t learn these things better any other way…

Thank you for taking the time and making the effort.. I commit to passing it on.

And I couldn’t help but crack up when I saw this.

(I’m assuming you’ve seen this type of meme go around. If you haven’t, clicking this will put it in context)

Reblogged from Bits of Wisdom. Every once in a while, a great one like this comes along..

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I’ve learned-
that you cannot make someone love you. All you can do is be someone who can be loved. The rest is up to them.

I’ve learned-
that no matter how much I care, some people just don’t care back.

I’ve learned-
that it takes years to build up trust, and only seconds to destroy it.

I’ve learned-
that no matter how good a friend is, they’re going to hurt you every once in a while and you must forgive them for that.

I’ve learned-
that it’s not what you have in your life but who you have in your life that counts.

I’ve learned-
that you should never ruin an apology with an excuse.

I’ve learned-
that you can get by on charm for about fifteen minutes. After that, you’d better know something.

I’ve learned-
that you shouldn’t compare yourself to the best others can do.

I’ve learned-
that you can do something in an instant that will give you heartache for life.

I’ve learned-
that it’s taking me a long time to become the person I want to be.

I’ve learned-
that you should always leave loved ones with loving words. It may be the last time you see them.

I’ve learned-
that you can keep going long after you can’t.

I’ve learned-
that we are responsible for what we do, no matter how we feel.

I’ve learned-
that either you control your attitude or it controls you.

I’ve learned-
that regardless of how hot and steamy a relationship is at first, the passion fades and there had better be something else to take its place.

I’ve learned-
that heroes are the people who do what has to be done when it needs to be done, regardless of the consequences.

I’ve learned-
that money is a lousy way of keeping score.

I’ve learned-
that my best friend and I can do anything or nothing and have the best time.

I’ve learned-
that sometimes the people you expect to kick you when you’re down will be the ones to help you get back up.

I’ve learned-
that sometimes when I’m angry I have the right to be angry, but that doesn’t give me the right to be cruel.

I’ve learned-
that true friendship continues to grow, even over the longest distance. Same goes for true love.

I’ve learned-
that just because someone doesn’t love you the way you want them to doesn’t mean they don’t love you with all they have.

I’ve learned-
that maturity has more to do with what types of experiences you’ve had and what you’ve learned from them and less to do with how many birthdays you’ve celebrated.

I’ve learned-
that you should never tell a child their dreams are unlikely or outlandish. Few things are more humiliating, and what a tragedy it would be if they believed it.

I’ve learned-
that your family won’t always be there for you. It may seem funny, but people you aren’t related to can take care of you and love you and teach you to trust people again. Families aren’t biological.

I’ve learned-
that it isn’t always enough to be forgiven by others. Sometimes you are to learn to forgive yourself.

I’ve learned-
that no matter how bad your heart is broken the world doesn’t stop for your grief.

I’ve learned-
that our background and circumstances may have influenced who we are, but we are responsible for who we become.

I’ve learned-
that a rich person is not the one who has the most, but is one who needs the least.

I’ve learned-
that just because two people argue, it doesn’t mean they don’t love each other. And just because they don’t argue, it doesn’t mean they do.

I’ve learned-
that we don’t have to change friends if we understand that friends change.

I’ve learned-
that you shouldn’t be so eager to find out a secret. It could change your life forever.

I’ve learned-
that two people can look at the exact same thing and see something totally different.

I’ve learned-
that no matter how you try to protect your children, they will eventually get hurt and you will hurt in the process.

I’ve learned-
that even when you think you have no more to give, when a friend cries out to you, you will find the strength to help.

I’ve learned-
that credentials on the wall do not make you a decent human being.

I’ve learned-
that the people you care about most in life are taken from you too soon.

I’ve learned-
that it’s hard to determine where to draw the line between being nice and not hurting people’s feelings, and standing up for what you believe.

I’ve learned-
that people will forget what you said, and people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

Before we take decisions, we make it out life’s purpose to ‘create options’. The bigger decisions, the more the options we like to have.

Yeah. I took that job and turned down blah, blah and blah. or

Yeah. I had great difficulty choosing that school. I had all these great schools to choose from.

Options make us feel good. They make us feel like we’re not desperate. Probably most importantly, they feed our illusion of control.

They don’t make our decisions easy by any stretch of the imagination unless we have one clear winner. If they are all equal or sort of equal, then choosing becomes a very difficult process. We end up consulting everyone relevant looking for a rational, logical reason and then end up taking a decision based on our emotions anyway..

That said, they still make us feel good at least for a little while. And nothing good comes without it’s share of challenge.

Paradoxically, the moment we make a decision and decide to plough ahead is the moment when options become like spoilt food in the fridge. Keep them for too long and they begin to stink. They remind us that they still exist and make us think of what life might have been if we had chosen them.

Sometimes, as a result of our visceral emotional reaction to losing things we have, we aim to keep as many options as we can open for as long as we possibly can. People do this with jobs, schools and often, even with relationships!

The issue here is that while options may give us a bit of joy the moment they appear – in the long run, they don’t really make us happy.

In fact, feeding them has exactly the opposite effect.

Predictable irrationality.

It probably comes down to our definition of success. We think of success as having an array of options and then choosing the most logical/rational option that would give us maximum benefit.

The big question, of course, is – Is that really success?

Every once in a while, I think about growth and learning.

A friend put it nicely the other day ‘I know what I need to improve. In fact, I know exactly what I need to improve. Getting me to do it though is the challenge.’

We all laughed. We all could relate.

It seems like we know but somehow, when push comes to shove, we don’t like to admit what we know. When it comes to deciding what we deem most important as this part of our lives, we push learning and growth away. We don’t seek help. We don’t spend time doing what it takes to change.

Why?

What would make us prioritize it higher?

I see the problem fairly clearly. The big problem here is that change is long term. The benefits are long term. And our elephant can’t live with long term. Our emotions love instant gratification even if it gets in the way of us doing good in the longer term. Why else have chat applications taken off like never before?

All this emphasis on social is living proof of that. Email, likes, retweets, push notifications have made it extremely hard for us to focus on the long term. We live in the now a lot more than we used too. ‘

And therein lies the biggest problem with bringing about change and with learning and growth. It’s akin to building. It takes many months, sometimes even years and we can only do it brick by brick. There’s no instant building. In fact, the greatest difficulty here is that the building calls for a change in foundation. So, it’s many months before something visible even happens. It calls for questioning, introspection, understanding, acceptance and then action. Who in the world has time for all that these days?

Why, even piling stones, one on top of each other would be a tough task. It really is the age of the instant.

The other surrounding problem (which, in my view, is probably the biggest of them all) is the lack of inspiration. Constant notifications and distractions make it really hard to spend time with ourselves and to ask ourselves the kind of questions that inspire growth.

The other source of inspiration is role models and mentors. While in the old days, we would struggle to have access to successful folk, now we have access to more potential role models than we could imagine. It is the age of abundance. Yet, what do about it?

What would make us do more about it?

It’s obvious that in the age of instant and social, self discipline and will power will become the most needed attributes of them all.

These are muscles at the end of the day. How are we going to be inspired enough to exercise them?

What can help?

There’s a lot of talk of changing the education system. It’s an idealist trait. Spot a problem with society and blame it on the education system. The biggest problem, though, is that the education we receive in school is not relevant for our times.

The real education we need is in developing the traits and the character to be able to handle the age of the instant and abundant.

Back to us and the most important question here – What would help us change? What would make us prioritize change, learning and growth?

Looking forward to your thoughts..

I think of TED Talks a bit like traveling. There are way too many good ones out there to watch them all. No, I’m not making time excuses. They’re just not high enough priority in the day to squeeze anything else, at least for the moment.

I rely on friends pushing in TED talks to watch them. And these days, I end up watching one only if a friend pushes them and tells me why they loved it so much.

The last 2 TED talks I watched were both very very good. The first one was Paul Zak’s talk on Morality and Oxytocin – it had a simple takeaway. We can change the world with 8 hugs a day because hugs stimulate the release of Oxytocin, which in turn, makes the world a better place by ensuring morality. As is the case with these things, simple concept – but hard to do. And I’m saying that as a very ‘hug-gy’ person (i.e. a person who would prefer a hug over a handshake if we know each other).

The next one that recommended twice by two different friends in a short period of time was Shawn Anchor’s talk on ‘The Happiness Advantage’. This is also a wonderful talk and Shawn makes us laugh almost all through the 12 minute duration.