INNOVATE:
The art of unlearning stuff!
We are told from an early stage that we need to be learning new things every day. What we are actually learning are things that have once been discovered for the first time by people with an inquisitive mind and willing to ask questions. We can often learn things that we at the time consider to be true and factual but as more knowledge is gained prove to be only part of the truth or plain wrong. I’m sure you can think of many such things you were once told.
I have a new rule for us to engage with… Every day find something to UNLEARN!
If its a family, business or just personal growth that you are involved with, applying the same rules and living in the same thinking can only produce the same results. Discovering new ways of thinking, and experimenting with new routines and habits can open doors for growth in surprising ways.
Some questions to ask that can help with unlearning; Why not? Who said I can’t? What if? Maybe there’s another way? Allowing everything to be up for the challenge can be a scary place but it will certainly cause you to re-evaluate what you actually think about things.
You will be surprised at how much you think, do and feel that have been ingrained in you from a child that just may not be true. Understanding is progressive, but when we start defending or entrenching ourselves into a way of thinking we cause the flow of new ideas to stop.
Flexible paradigms:
A paradigm is a set of rules that if followed leads to a successful outcome. Think about crossing the road. In the UK you learn to look right, look left look right again. This usually ensures a safe passage across the road. This paradigm is true as long as it is used in the context of the UK, however, if you try applying this in the USA or in Europe where people drive on the other side of the road the outcome may be less successful.
We hold many paradigms in our lives that we stick to instinctively almost without question. However, we fail to comprehend that the context in which they used to work so well has changed. This requires an UNLEARNING of these rules in order to navigate the new context. These paradigms are usually fashioned from experiance bit good and bad, and so developing new ones will require some good and bad experiences first before you arrive at the rules of success but aware that every time the context changes we may well have to restart the process and establish the rules again.
Don’t worry you get much better at this as time goes on!