Learning is hard.
I’d like to think that learning is fun but when faced with learning something completely new that I have not had any prior experience with I have often experienced a sense of fear and anxiety and I must overcome a strong desire to quit before I even try. Learning challenges the mind and the body. It requires intellect and muscle memory.
I am not alone in this fear. After 25 years of teaching photography I can assure you that most of my students experience anxiety and fear at the start of a new class or even just a new module within a class.
Learning is Type II Fun that REI defines as, “miserable while it’s happening, but fun in retrospect.“
This spring I faced my fears to learn two new skill sets. First, in March I earned my certification in sailing that enables me to charter any sailboat between 30 and 50 feet around the world.
I put that training to a test recently when my wife and I chartered a 35 foot sailboat in the San Juan Islands for a week. We faced gale force winds, fog, currents, and tides. It was enough of a challenge to raise the anxiety meter up to a level that qualified as exciting and exhilarating. Fortunately, I had conquered most of my fears during my certification class and was able to navigate the challenges we faced without losing the overall sense of enjoyment.
In April I became a new learner again when I took one of my motorcycles through a dirt bike riding class. I felt a profound vulnerability to physical injury if I crashed the bike or even dropped it.
The instructor would ask me to do something such as riding up a steep hill side and then bringing the bike to a stop and make a u-turn. The overall concept is one of finding a balance that exerts zero weight on the bike and then trust the motorcycle to make the maneuver without falling over.
I dropped the motorcycle four times during the class but within a month of taking the course I was riding more technical terrain than I ever thought possible which was culminated in an overnight camping trip near a remote waterfall and river. So far I haven’t dropped the bike once since that first class.
In each of these learning experiences I recognized that there was a gap between physical experience and technical knowledge. The absence of experience created the fear and anxiety.
Overcoming the fear of learning really required me to cultivate a high level of technical knowledge combined with practice.
To develop my technical knowledge I took classes, read textbooks and watched a lot of training videos on Youtube. I have found the technical knowledge doesn’t ease the anxiety a whole lot but it does give me a sense of direction as to what I skill I need to attempt and recognition for when I am doing it right.
On one off-road riding video the instructor used the term intellectual bearings to describe the relationship between knowledge and experience. Technical knowledge gives me a direction to apply my effort towards. I fell in love with that simple concept because it opened up so much dialogue in my head about how to be a good learner and not be afraid of taking on new challenges.
From these experiences I realized some insight into my own teaching practice and how the lectures I give are really my attempt to establish an intellectual bearing for my students that guides them towards achieving their learning goals.
As I reflect on this concept I think intellectual bearings start with a previsualization of a goal that is followed by research that drives practice. I need intellectual knowledge (bearings) to know what to practice and how to evaluate the effort.
Equipped with the intellectual bearings of any domain of knowledge I feel I am able to lean into the fear and anxiety which results in an experience of emotional euphoria when I achieve the goal.
In the case of our recent sailing trip, each day started with developing a navigation and safety plan that looks at tides, currents, wind, and navigation charts while plotting a compass course and waypoints. There is the math of converting fathoms to feet, distance and time, and looking for hidden rocks and shoals along the way.
While under sail there was the technical knowledge needed for managing lines for tacking and jibing, and at one point even how to double reef the mainsail when the winds got up to 25 knots and the boat started to heal over into the water too far on the starboard side.
We made it through our recent journey without mishap for which I am sure we were aided with a bit of luck. I believe in the saying “fortune favors the prepared.”
When everything goes well there is nothing more exciting and fulfilling than taking on new learning experiences. I look forward more learning experiences in the near future.
Cheers,
Ira