Learning to apply the essence
What next with it?
I have been muddling about what next for over more than 2 years. All the time. And I recently got to deeply thinking about it while listening to the only book I finished this April - “How we learn” - by Benedict Carey. One small segment on learning resonated quite deeply with me. And I have extracted it from the book below:
Transfer is what learning is all about, really. It’s the ability to extract the essence of a skill or a formula or word problem and apply it in another context, to another problem that may not look the same, at least superficially. If you’ve truly mastered a skill, you “carry it with you,” so to speak.
Carey, Benedict. How We Learn (p. 155). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
This book is an excellent compendium of various sources on learning concepts and techniques (some of which I have read independently). I know what I do want to do next. Take the millions of patterns of formal and informal learning acquired in my life to help others look at things from varying and different perspectives. In my own quirky and unique way.
If I have truly had some learnings worth leveraging, whether or not I am able to help others apply it for some value in another context will be the true test that I have learned something at all this lifetime.
The essence for me that my life was truly worth living. This one time.