How to Learn (August 2011 Edition)

I've recently been slammed with several opportunities to talk about what I'm learning. I talked about learning on retreat, in progress reports, in several of my personal relationships and in other informal setting. I was even asked, "so what do you do, to learn?" I thought this was a very odd question and it actually amused me. But I did think about it. 

I also thought of an analogy. Learning is like a waterfall. The constantly moving river of life won't stop hurling itself over the ledge of change while you stand underneath and wonder what on earth is going on. When you're standing under the waterfall, all you see is life coming at you while you doggy-paddle childishly. It's also the rainy reason in Cambodia, so the river is expanding. And such is life, utter chaos.

So how do you learn? Well, first, you start by doing something you don't know how to do.

Secondly, you do it over and over and over and over again. Practice makes perfect, apparently. I don't know about that, but practice teaches you, and practice keeps you humble.

And third, you figure out what it was you were learning, but this happens when you're old (sometimes dead).

I don't really know what I'm learning. I learned how to drive. I learned how to bake bread. I learned how to travel on the night train. I also (I'm proud of this) learned how to kill huge bugs in my apartment (which involved destroying my mop, long story). For the above situations, you have a baseline (can't do it), indicators of success (get on train, wait for bread to rise), and then the end-line (I can do this activity!). These were the easier things that I've learned recently.

But for life...who knows. Am I more patient? Am I more empathetic? What have I learned in Cambodia that's worth adding to my repertoire of healthy and admirable behaviors, attitudes and values?

Who knows. If anything, learning is non-linear. It's not a neat process like baking bread or driving to work. You take steps forward, and then you backtrack, and then you have a breakdown sobbing on the floor binge drinking pepsi lemon, and then eventually and mysteriously you're excited and try again weeks later with only moderately depressing results, and then you end up going in a different direction. I know that didn't make sense. Learning doesn't make sense either because no matter what conventional wisdom or self-improvement would have you believe, it's a long and complicated process with unclear results. However, it will happen. Because time doesn't actually stand still and we're constantly facing new situations which have the potential to teach us.

But, at least I do something I don't know how to do...a lot...too much actually...exhaustively in fact. So I must be learning. In fact what's written here is one lesson I've learned. Maybe one day I'll be able to label and quantify what I'm learning at this stage in life. After all, hindsight is 20/20...if I'm alive then.