Learning Curves

Sometimes they’re steep, sometimes they’re not. Sometimes they’re pleasurable, sometimes they’re not. Learning curves.

We all encounter them. The issue isn’t that. The issue is how we respond to them. Personally, I feel that a day that goes by without learning something (anything) is a wasted day! Learning is as natural to me as breathing.

How about you?

Lots of folks fall into viscous resistance when it comes to learning new things. Lots. Why? There are myriad reasons. One is a history of difficulty in learning. In recent years, a lot of people have been diagnosed with learning disabilities. ADD. ADHD.

In my opinion, they’re often used as catch-all diagnoses for a more insidious subtext: we don’t know what’s wrong, but let’s medicate anyway. I know plenty of people on whom the drugs prescribed for these maladies don’t work. Why should that be?

Well, usually when I work with folks with these sorts of diagnoses, I discover that they have trouble paying attention. Difficulty in paying attention is usually caused by some sort of major distraction in a life.

An historical event that was traumatic …

A current experience that’s upsetting …

Fear of a future event ….

I think it’s better to consider learning “disabilities” as what they really are: teaching disabilities. I learned about this from the founders of NLP—neurolinguistic programming. Everyone has his or her own learning style, and it is incumbent upon all teachers to learn about their differences.

Some of us learn best visually.

Some of us learn best auditorily.

Some of us learn best kinesthetically.

Eyes, Ears, Sensations are other ways to say this.

Knowing your own learning style is crucial to enjoying learning. If you’re a kinesthetic, and learn things best by doing them, your IT person can explain it for days, but until you get to run the program yourself, it won’t mean anything.

So give it a thought, won’t you? What is your preferred learning style?

Once you know that, then your learning curves will change. Arrange to learn the hard things in your preferred style. Learn the simpler ones in a style that isn’t particularly natural to you.

The goal is to learn, and how you do that is up to you.

For spiritual nourishment visit Dr. Corso’s blog, Seeds for Sanctuary