Changing to Accommodate

I had obstacles to overcome with the Yoga Centre I joined. The style did make a few minor adaptations for Western tastes. Like moving breathing exercises to the start of classes, so people didn’t just leave after the “exercise”. And charging, because there weren’t enough people from the community willing to finance the centre. 

The school was conservative, and on the surface seemed religious. I was told Yoga was not religious, but it looks, swims, and quacks like a duck? There are people who treat it like a religion, and the Vendantic philosophy has big overlaps with Hinduism. Again, there are many who will argue that Hinduism and Buddhism were philosophies, not religions. That is not something I understood. I am from a Christian background, which despite the multiple and expanding versions (with a long history of schisms) still (as I understood it) argues that there is one fundamental truth... even if there is disagreement about what that is, you have to wrestle with it. 

That always worried me. If we can’t come to an agreement, we have to go our separate ways. Fortunately, the yoga centre was “holistic”. I could ignore lots of the pageantry, and focus on the practical bits. Proper breathing, diet, exercise, relaxation and mental health. Five basic points to return to whatever you are struggling with.

Beautiful Chaos

Even if you are micro-ambitious, you want to be able to keep momentum in the stuff you do. To be building on what you have done before. Constantly taking iterative steps. Trial and error. Learning, unlearning, relearning. 

We don’t know how the world and our path is going to play out. The information is not there. It is not that there is stuff you don’t know or that someone else knows and they need to tell you. You get to the point where you realise we are all experiencing the world in a different way. That is great. That is something to celebrate. It is okay. 

To empower others, we don’t have to go out and convince everyone to see the world in the way that we do. We do not have the capacity to understand the world. It is too complex. We don’t even experience the whole world. 

We experience a sliver of it. We get different information through touch, sight, hearing, smell and taste. It is fun to imagine yourself as tiny or huge, and how the laws of physics would change. Not in their essence, but in how they relate to you... and how you experience and interpret the beautiful chaos.

Turbulence

 

Risk and Reward

I am not sure whether I consider myself a “risk taker”. I go through waves, phases, and situations where I am very risk averse and others where I am comfortable with discomfort. When I think of when I was a little guy, there are definitely stories where I was absolutely fearless, and others in the opposite direction. There was a big chap that I had an intense rivalry with at school. I was... not big. I was tiny. Smaller than most of the girls. Still, I played Hooker in Rugby until I was 12 years old. My fearlessness (at that stage) meant I didn’t seem to realise I was so small. My nemesis was in the first team, and I was in the second (of two), and we used to do drills against each other for tap-and-run. Jones would regularly take the taps, and I’d be the guy who would want to tackle him. Maybe it was because of our personal rivalry, but maybe it was because the bigger they are the harder they fall. If you get the tackle right, it doesn’t matter how big they are. It didn’t seem to matter to me that I normally didn’t get the tackle right, and got munched. The (few) times I did were worth it. Risk and reward.

Allowing for Bull

It is worth reading the book, “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie. The name sounds terrible. I put off reading it for years because the title seemed repulsively insecure and insincere. I was wrong. There are very valuable principles clearly articulated. One of those key ideas is building on what people say. We want feedback. But we want feedback in a way that we actually believe that the person giving it wants us to move forward. We want to feel like they are being constructive. If you are constantly niggling at someone, and tearing them down, what you are not doing, is allowing a Bull Quota. A Bull Quota is when you suspend your disbelief. Allowing a buffer for things that can distract you from the important stuff. That quota can eventually be full, but not allowing it prevents deep listening. Like when you are watching a movie. If you are intent on critiquing each word and pointing out the holes, you won’t be able to enjoy the story. Are you looking for the truth in the story? Are you even looking for something that contributes? Because everything has gaps and holes, as we clumsily try to communicate from one grasp at reality to another. Don’t live in the holes.

Don't prematurely call Bull

 

Colourful Delight

To really gain an understanding of the world, you need a pinch of salt for the way you think things work. Understanding that can be quite frustrating when things do not respond the way you thought they would. When we are children, we are much more willing to let things play out. We enjoy being surprised. It delights us when things are interesting. Rather than the joy of a fascinated two-year-old, we can be enraged. 

Ken Robinson pointed out that almost all children believe they can draw when they are 5 years old. You learn your way out of creativity. By the age of 15, someone has convinced most of us we cannot draw. Our creativity is bounded by the belief that we need to be sorted by conspicuous, immediate, competency. We stop learning as we create a story about who we are, and how we control the world. We specialize to get recognition for how we are special. We tell stories so that we can categorise and create boxes in which we can find comfort. A safe space we understand. That allows us to ignore the world that is not the way we want.

Comfort within Discomfort

Find comfort within discomfort. That does not mean pushing through pain. With yoga and stretching, to progress, you do not need to hurt yourself. You can learn within limits. You can learn by understanding the boundaries, and doing the work inside of that. Playing, and moving around, in your areas of slight discomfort. Be curious about transitions that are not smooth.

A lot of meditative work can be done through movement and dancing. Being aware of, “Ooo, this bit there is tight. I am going to move my shoulder more. I am a bit stiff in my lower back, I am going to do some moving there.” It is about understanding where you carry your tension. You can go for a run. A swim. Lift your arms over your head. Pick something up. Reach for something. Our minds learn in the way our body does. Through an embodied use-it-or-loose-it process of leaning into areas of discomfort (without hurting yourself) and building endurance and resilience. Through consistent engagement.

Twist and Breathe

Bound Slave

Although building Engines is an incredibly empowering financial goal, I prefer to think like Michelangelo. The Italian sculptor would create his pieces from a block of marble, by removing rather than by adding. The final piece was trapped within the block awaiting release. One of the challenges we face given almost everyone lives hand-to-mouth (even those with big hands and big mouths) is that we end up manufacturing discontent. Money is often made by convincing someone that there is a gap between their reality and something better. That there is something wrong with their life, and by implication them, now. That the only way to achieve the success, recognition, and validation they seek is through more. I believe, and not in a fluffy that’s-so-cute way, that we can learn more from people with less. That what is often required to still the financial waves is seeing that stillness is already within your grasp. Internalising behaviours. Taking a breath. Learning to pause. Seeing versus striving. Gently chipping away at the obstacles.

"Bound Slave - known as Atlas"

Michelangelo (1530-1534)

Wealth Building

Wealth building takes time. We love stories of outliers and exponential shifts. There is no shortage of discontent pedlars who will sell you the secrets to 10X your life. Long-term investing is way less sexy than that, and way more powerful. Not everyone can be Roger Federer. Trying to be Roger Federer can lead to a lifetime of disappointment and anxious self-attack. Everyone can be themselves. Everyone can start from where they are, and build an empowering container for their particular form of creativity. If they are prepared to truly commit to long-term wealth creation. Where wealth is mastery. This isn’t get-rich-quick. This isn’t a 6-month plan to turnaround your life. A 15-year plan is more powerful. Particularly if it starts with acceptance rather than turnaround. Simply and honestly looking at the skills and knowledge you have, and the menu that is available. There may be options you are shutting off from by Rogering yourself.

Via Cape Town

When I was 14, I had an incredibly gifted Maths teacher named Mrs Chick. Everybody loved her, and she loved everybody. I had a habit of driving her nuts though. Particularly in Geometry. I would arrive at the solution, but she said I 'always went via Cape Town'. We lived in Durban. To give some context, Pretoria to Durban is 627km. Going to Pretoria (via Cape Town) is 3,000km (depending on the route). I left South Africa for the first time as an adult when I was 18. I had never visited Cape Town. It was far away!

One of the companies I was later a part of was full of smart people, united by the fact that we were all weird in some little way. One smart was not the same as the next. They clashed, and brought up different things. That is clearly true of everyone in the world, but being in the same company gives you a common purpose that requires interaction, and interdependence.

I used to do a lot of public speaking, and would actively seek out feedback by doing lots of dry runs. These dry runs were draining. Not only would the audience see things I didn't, or understand things differently to how I intended, but they weren't shy to let me know. Each session would leave me a little punch drunk. I would go back, tweak, and then have another crack. By the time I got to actually doing the talks to the real world, the multiple sets of eyes and minds had given me a wealth of practice.

I believe in independent thinking. That each of us can add something by clearing our minds of what others think, and looking afresh. We see the world differently, and no one else will ever see it in the same way. Our realities are built up by the experiences we have had, the conversations we have had, the things we have read, and the time we live. Only one of us does it the way we do.

I also believe in thinking in the open. It is confusing. You need a thick skin and emotional resilience. It is much easier to push on in the dark until you find something 'worthy' of the light. Easy restricts us from the benefits of exposure to other minds. We don't have to take on board everything everyone else says. We can't. But the more we listen, the brighter our torch to find a path.

So onwards. With a sense of humour. Dive in. Get lost. Learn. Just make lots of noises so people know where you are, and can point out other routes.

Space Chip

My friend Clair (a poet) shared her favourite warm-up tongue-twister, 'There is a chip shop in space, that sells space ship shaped chips'. Say that ten times fast. When I was about 7, I was struggling academically. I have never been good at pretending I understand things when I don't. I get a 'deer in the headlights' look. I withdraw. A group of us were put into 'Speech & Drama' classes as remedial therapy for those struggling in the classroom. Lots of tongue twisters. It is a great example of how 'the problem is not always the problem'. Some how the tongue twisters also untwisted my learning ability. I am still a slow learner. I still get lost in the grass for long periods. Discomfort and confusion is completely necessary in the learning process. When we are kids, they are met with love and compassion. When we are adults, they can be met with derision. Perhaps we could all do with more Space Ship Shaped Chips.

Space Chip

ukuphindaphinda

Enye yeendlela iindlela abantwana bafunda ngazo, kukuphindaphinda. Bazokopisha abazali babo nootitshala. Amagama nezenzo ziphindaphinda ngokuphindaphindiweyo njengomdlalo. Ukuqonda akukho, kodwa bafundisa imizimba yabo. Imizimba yabo iyazuza ukuqonda ngendlela. Xa ndizama ukufunda iSiXhosa, andizange ndikwazi ukuphinda ndiphinde ndiyidlale. Into endiyibonayo inegama lesiNgesi eliqhotyoshelweyo. Iimvakalelo zesiNgesi. Ngcamango zesiNgesi. Andikholelwa ukuba ukufunda iilwimi malunga nokukwazi ukuguqulela igama elinye. Ngokuphathelele ukwakha iwebhu yokuqonda. Ukufumana imibuzo emihle. Ukusebenzisa ukungaqondi, kodwa ukhululekile kunye nokungahambi kahle kokufunda.

Slow Learner

I am a slow learner. I am just very stubborn, and comfortable with the discomfort of appearing stupid and making mistakes in public. 'Things coming easy' isn't actually a sign of someone being sustainably good at something. The top riders in the Tour de France are definitely hurting more than a completely unfit beginner scared of going for a ride because it will hurt to start. It doesn't get easier. The best of the best just push on into that discomfort. There are also two paths to learning - deep and wide. You can't really do both. The great thing is we learn cumulatively, so the important thing is keeping connections, and trust, between us so the learning can be shared. My preference is being a constant beginner so that I am only a step or two away from most people I meet in learning something about something they care about deeply. Close enough to listen.

Parallel Joy

We run along parallel to many sources of joy, meaning and fulfilment if we define ourselves to narrowly. If we aren't able to overcome some of the barriers built of a lack of awareness or discomfort. If we aren't able to get to experience the other side. 

I tried some Capoeira classes last year. It was a wonderful experience that I definitely want to get more of. The teacher described the place where the beauty of Capoeira lies as a dance between the forces of gravity pushing down, and our strength pushing up. Each movement up goes down first. Each movement down starts by going up. There is a flow. When the forces equal each other, there is a lightness. Music. Poetry. 

I am training for the Comrades Marathon. At 89km long, there are going to be a lot of forces flowing through my body. It is famously difficult and yet famously open to everybody. You qualify by running a Marathon and entering before they hit the limit of 20,000 people. I grew up on the route. We used to cheer the leaders as they flew by. Bruce Fordyce and Frith van der Merwe were childhood heros. Fordyce winning every year for the first decade of my life, bar 1989. In 1989, van der Merwe obliterated the woman's record and finished 15th overall in a time of under 6 hours. Most people aren't uber athletes. Their cheers were a mixture of awe, sympathy, support and a transfer of any will power possible. They are parents, uncles, aunts, friends, colleagues and teachers who are waking up early or going for runs after work. Transforming their bodies. Slowly building up to finishing the race in under 12 hours. On the road almost twice as long as the legends.

Bruce Fordyce and Hosea Tjale (Comrades Marathon)

The Capoeira feels relevant as I slowly build up. I have been doing it very slowly. Following the advice that your breath is your best coach. If you aren't breathing comfortably, you are running to fast. As my muscles strengthen, and my joints get stronger, there are passages of running where that balance of gravity and my force seem to be in sync. When I am comfortably moving along. Breathing easily. Outside. Floating.

Wandering the routes around where I live, it feels like as my body slowly builds resilience, I am also growing into the area. Not quite like hoping on a train under the ground. I run past unusual shops. I recognise side streets. I discover alternative routes. Where I live becomes more a part of who I am, in the same way as I am becoming a runner.

Beyond some discomfort, lies a broader you. A stronger you. A you where the ups and downs of life find lightness of being.

Tough Stuff

Fun things often have rules. Rules often aren't fun. Blast. Chapter 3 of Steven Pinker's book The Sense of Style talks about The Curse of Knowledge and how 'the better you know something, the less you remember how hard it was to learn'. Part of this is the difficulty but another part is the lack of fun. Before something is exciting there has to be a spark of understanding or of inspiration. Once you have that flame burning, to teach or show someone something you need to be able to understand or remember what it is like without that. The early stages of learning something are often plain hard. The great teachers are the ones who can provide the energy or the drive to make it worth the hard slog up front. Perhaps they are even able to break a task down into small chunks when the hurdles are small enough to get a taste of the fun. To turn learning into a game.

Chapter 4 of Pinker's book is the bit that isn't fun. Grammar. Learning the rules is important since, as an example, it arms you 'when an editor or grammatical stickler claims to find an error in a sentence you wrote, but you don't see anything wrong with it, you can at least understand the rule in question well enough to decide for yourself whether to follow it'. Beyond just feeding your ability to defend yourself, having a solid foundation does allow you to have more fun later.

Source: www.harrybliss.com

Drills. Fitness. Theory. Discomfort.

Part of gaining an ability to be able to pick up new skills is figuring out how to enjoy the 'horrible bits'. Like learning to enjoy washing the dishes by doing it with a glass of wine and some music playing. There are those who love ironing because they set it up in space of the house they love, create an atmosphere they enjoy and it becomes meditative. For those tasks though, you don't have to be mentally present for the task. For things where you have to be present, there must also be tricks.

I think that is the main role of mentors, coaches, teachers, study-buddies, being part of a team, or even just wanting to be able to use the new ability to engage with people at a later stage - to get a spark going, or keep a flame burning to make the tough stuff worth while.

Before You Even Start

The reason I am so interested in the initial stages of learning is because that is before you have had any wins. There is a discrepancy between what people say they want to do, and what they do. Getting started seems to be the hardest part. I don't think confusion/hard work/learning ever disappears, but for the most part you are unsure of whether it is worth the effort because you aren't sure if you are capable or if you are just going to be wasting effort. Rather do nothing than try and figure out you can't do it. At least then you can think you might be able to do something rather than 'proving' you can't. 

Often there are tricks to make things easier, but the tricks require laying groundwork that seems just as intimidating. My approach to trying to learn more languages is to try learn some of these tricks via Fluent Forever. This is requiring learning IPA and watching and re watching the many helpful (but still initially challenging) videos Gabe Wyner has put together. Sal Khan of the Khan Academy started out by putting tutorials on YouTube for his cousins. They said they actually preferred these to him giving them lessons. Videos have a guilt free pause button and zero impatience. When someone is teaching you, you feel like you are wasting their time admitting you are lost. The same happens in business meetings. Perhaps there should be a little button in front of people to slide to their degree of 'lostness'. Or pre-recorded 'tutorials'. 

The truth is the initial stages of learning are very slow, and you feel rather incompetent. You haven't had the wins yet for it to feel fun. Perhaps that is why we learn better when there is external motivation. For languages, that is often a romantic interest. For Gabe Wyner, it was his love of opera. For me, I have made unsustained romantic stabs, but my primary motivator is that I feel cut off from most of the world by only speaking English. To really get to know someone and to understand other cultures, I think you need to speak their mother tongue. The world is full of flavour - I want to taste more.

Every Day & Comfortable Confusion

Gabe Wyner has written a book and has a website and other tools to help people become 'Fluent Forever'. I am slowly making my way through the material each day targeting French to try and break me out of my monolingualism (my Afrikaans is too much in need of resuscitation to count). I am still very much in the confused state. Wyner came to language through his love for music (he is an Opera singer) and the approach using the door of sound and recall (recognising rather than memorising) fascinates me. While the tools are helpful, my impatient Rider has to be constantly reminded to breathe and be kind to my Elephant. Gaining comfort with confusion seems to be essential in picking up new skills. I also think regularity is important. I have been busy teaching two Yoga courses at the moment. One finishes today (Yoga 1) and another finished on Tuesday (Yoga 2). The Yoga 2 course was once a week. The Yoga 1 course for complete beginners has been every day for 4 days. Both courses had 4 installments. It is incredible seeing the difference in progress between the two classes. Elephants seem to have weak short term memories, but if you give them regular, kind attention guiding them through their confusion - they never forget. That's the theory - and if true, hopefully my Elephant will slowly make more sense of Wyner's video below.

The Mist

Learning often feels like you are covered in a thick mist. You make your way along a path with heightened senses, apprehension, and depending on how much you know of the destination - excitement. Occasionally, you feel like the path clears somewhat with a gap in the grey and you make solid progress. Then the mist descends again. 

I definitely feel like this with investing. Businesses are hard to understand. There are so many variables and years of studying only provides you with the letters, some of the grammar, and a few favourite memorised passages. Each business is a new book, with regular new editions. Capitalism is more like English where new words are being invented all the time, and the meanings of words are changing than French where a central committee strongly protect the language. Even when you think you understand, the mist descends again. The misunderstanding is that we like to think one day the mist clears and the expert sees with great clarity. 

The truth is the real leaders are always shrouded. This mist exists in all fields. Great Musicians are constantly practising new techniques, mastering new pieces. For Sportsmen, this mist might be pain if they are marathon runners or closer to music if they are Messi. The art is perhaps making sure you don't go down paths where you see nothing and get lost, but don't spend your days dancing along paths you already know without creating new ones.

Image Source: http://www.dwotd.nl/web-log/photos/uncategorized/2009/10/06/mist_2.jpg

Your Inner Infant

I am attempting to learn a few things at the moment. Some more from scratch than others. I did try learning the piano before (1998-2001) but gave up when study commitments took over. My attempts at guitar were less structured and much less significant and never really got anywhere. I am very interested in the first 100 hours of learning a new skill. Mostly because of the barrier it presents. My fingers feel like infants. I get bored quickly despite my very real long term desire to connect to music. I haven't had the time before to push through this. Reading an article by de Botton on Melanie Klein (1882 -1960), it seemed to capture the initial emotion of learning a new skill.

In relation to this mother, all the infant experiences are moments of intense pain and then, for reasons it can’t understand, moments of equally intense pleasure - Alain de Botton on Melanie Klein

The infants trauma is clearly far more intense. As an adult I know the end of my world hasn't come because my fingers won't do what they are supposed to. But it is easy to give up. Another de Botton article talked about the changing attitudes towards parenting and the theories of Donald Winnicott.

It must have felt very odd, in 1954, to tune into BBC Radio at prime time and hear someone, with a gentle, intelligent voice, arguing incisively against the idea that babies cry ‘to get attention’ - Alain de Botton on Donald Winnicott

I think there is something to learning in the First 100 hours that is similar to parenting. Parents have learnt that a child is not inherently evil when they misbehave or attention seeking when they cry. As adults learning new skills, perhaps we need to be similarly kind when learning new things that just because we can't do it, and our 'fingers won't listen', doesn't mean we are bad at that skill. We need to push through our infancy to the stage where we can play.

Explain it to your Granny

I have always liked the idea that you can judge whether you understand something by whether you are able to explain it. That the core, important idea behind most things is quite simple - but finding that simplicity is the tough thing. If you get it, you can 'explain it to your granny'.

But perhaps the world is actually more complex than we like to think? We like stories. The world makes more sense to us when we can provide a narrative.

I am about half way through Tyler Cowen's 'Average is Over'. In it he is covering many really interesting things, and it is definitely worth reading. One of the subjects he touches on is dealing with complexity or being comfortable with uncomfortable positions. He looks at 'Computers v Man' in chess. It took a long time before computers finally claimed the scalp of a world champion - Gary Kasparov was beaten by IBM's Big Blue. Nowadays a man alone doesn't stand a chance. Comfortingly, a computer alone can also be beaten by the team of a man and a computer.

One of the areas where computers have taught man to be better is seeing through situations that are uncomfortable. Having seen computers play 'ugly moves' and come out winning, more of the Grandmasters are prepared to fight through periods of discomfort or chaos. Fighting for a narrative and a simple answer is probably still worthwhile, but recognising that you can still move forward when you don't have a complete answer to a very complex situation is perhaps the bravery required for brilliance.

A Black Guitar

Despite the man partly responsible for my learning where Middle C on a piano is going, 'Oh no......' on hearing of my purchase of a guitar, I am quite chuffed. I know nothing about how to play it, but I am looking forward to the ride. I have written before about fighting through discomfort and have become a bit of a discomfort junkie.

Being able to look back on periods of not having a clue, and plodding along till you do is a great feeling. But of course... I am not doing this for the already sore fingers or to destroy the eardrums of unsuspecting neighbours. I actually want to be able to play.

The push over the line to buy the guitar and get cracking was a combination of last weekend in Paris, some live music at The Half Moon in Putney and a rumbling that has never quite quietened.

We'll see... Exciting times.