Two types of learning

There is simple learning, which is learning how to do the same things better.

Then, there is generative learning, which is learning how to do new things.

Our futures become more predictable and more certain by doing the same things we did yesterday, over and over again.

It is easy to seduce ourselves into thinking that repetitive motion makes us better. That’s the way we were taught at school, right?

But real learning occurs when we learn something new, something different, something that has never been done before (by us anyway).

It is when we learn to connect the dots we can begin to see a completely new world. A world full of possibilities.

That kind of learning, the kind of learning from reading an insightful blog or the right book that changed the way you think, is when you realize not what you know but how much you don’t know.

There is nothing wrong with simple learning. But exploiting what we did yesterday, getting a little faster and a little cheaper, isn’t going to get us to the places we want to go.