Being able to do so makes us so much more effective – we break through ‘log jams’ more easily. It makes us more creative – we are more attuned to finding the new solution rather than justifying the old or fighting the new. We become more effective and creative – not a bad return for a little skill enhancement.

So, how can you learn to hold conflicting thoughts with greater ease and maybe even delight? Can we hone this skill? Here are three actions you can take to do so. They are listed in the order of difficulty.

Turn things upside down. Really. Take a familiar object, turn it upside down and look at it critically. Do it every time you think of it. This will enhance your curiosity – your ability to discover something new.

Read different topics than you usually do. I have been a gardener for many years. I love to read about varieties of plants just to learn what they like, how they perform, what challenges them to produce more and better fruit. My daily reading now is about leadership. The topic is rich, producing over a hundred books every year. Yet, as I read through them, I find I automatically test the premises I encounter with my knowledge of plants. Another time, I began reading about architecture. Suddenly, I could see new relationships between space and how people interact in various spaces, an entirely new insight for me. Reading in other areas frees us from our assumptions for a moment– just long enough to see a new perspective on a familiar topic.

Engage in conversations with those you may not agree with. This is a very different kind of conversation. This is not an exercise in argumentation or winning or convincing the other. This is an exercise in probing until you understand their perspective so well, you can explain it back to them to their full agreement. If you do this well, you will have enhanced your ability to see different sides of an issue.  (More than likely you will also enhance your friendship with this person. People truly appreciate being listened to.)

Deep curiosity, freedom from assumptions, and seeing the other side more clearly – three great skills that help you to not just hold conflicting thoughts, but to enjoy doing so.

For those of you who have read the Harry Potter series, you will recall the amazing ceiling of the great hall that always appears as the sky does outside – pinpointed with stars on a clear night, running clouds on a rainy day. Well, once again fiction leads invention. Fast Company just reported on a German firm that has developed a virtual sky for use indoors. What I loved most about it is the report that people who work under this virtual sky work enjoy its movement over the course of the day. The new lighting promotes concentration and heightens alertness. Now, how good is that?

I have always tried to offer my staff natural lighting wherever they are working. I remember the outrage from my fellow managers when I offered a corner office to the three customer reps who spent their days in the phone with irate users. I stood my ground and said they were the face or our department. If they felt good, they would convey that to our customers. My colleagues never got over it, but my staff were excellent performers. Customers rated us highest in service, and my staff were in the 90^th percentile of the attitude survey. I didn’t need that corner office just to impress others. My intention was to impress through our performance, and I think we did.

After reading the article about the virtual sky ceiling, I found myself understanding better why the natural light was effective. If indeed, movement in the sky as well as the subtly beautiful color changes are actually part of what makes us humans more alert. Being more alert means that learning, as well as work, is improved. There was a song back when that said, ‘bring on the clowns.’ I always thought the words were ‘bring on the clouds.’ Today, I have decided that my version has more validity than I thought.

What’s the best setting for your learning? Is it sitting on the patio in the sunshine, at a quiet corner, in a busy coffee shop? Where is the sky?

Bring on the clouds!

As a teenager, I put my mind on seeds. I collected seeds from all sorts of plants. I learned how to gather them – there really is a science about when it is the right time to gather seeds. Cleome flowers (sometimes called spider flowers) develop long pods of seeds that at just the right moment, spring open and spray the seeds out, leaving nothing in the pod. You have to be fast to catch them just before that moment. I learned how to extract seeds from inside a fruit.  I don’t mean opening up the core of an apple and extracting the seed, I mean the more challenging form of extracting the seed from the spinning ‘helicopters’ of a maple tree. I learned which seeds needed to be dried before they were stored and which came ready for immediate display.

To this very day, I can recognize a seed right out of the seed envelop – yes, without reading the cover. Holding it in my hand, I can almost see the plant bursting to come forth once it is planted and allowed to grow. I put my mind to learning about seeds, and I did. I still have an enormous respect for the magic of seeds.

On the other hand, I never put my mind to spelling when I was in school. I got A’s in math and the only D I ever got, in spelling. I limped along for years until one day, I realized that ignoring this topic was holding me back – it even embarrassed me not to be able to spell. So, I put my mind to it. For a whole year, I looked up every word that was even in the least questionable to me. (And that was a lot of words!) By the end of the year, a funny thing happened. I was spelling words that would have been impossible for me to even consider looking up without at least the first letter, and I was spelling words that I didn’t even know before that year began. Putting my mind to it did more for me than I anticipated. I thought it would allow me to spell the words I knew. What I discovered through this year was that I had developed a vocabulary well beyond what I began with. (You have to read the words around the word you are looking for in the dictionary. Sometimes you even begin to read about them. Yes, reading the dictionary in small spurts is possible – and can be enjoyable.)

At the end of that year, I happened coincidentally to take the GRE (Graduate Record Exam). I knew I would do well in the mathematics section, but I didn’t anticipate that I would ace the word comprehension section. If I hadn’t before, I now totally respected the power of spelling and the door it opens to other things.

As I write this, I am beginning to think I should ‘put my mind to learn’ about something. I’m not one for resolutions. I’m an action-oriented person out of the starting gate. But, the idea of focusing on something to learn is totally intriguing. And as it was with seeds and spelling, part of the fun is not anticipating the unexpected benefits. How great is that?

What are you going to put your mind to learn this year?

Happy holidays!

There is another kind of longing that fills whole groups of people. Those in war, long for peace. Those who are discriminated against, long to be accepted. Those who are ill, long to regain their health. When I look at American society, I see many people longing for a sense of security – some from terrorists, but many more from economic ruin. People value independence yet long for a sense of belonging as they struggle with the aloneness that comes from independence. We are a nation that longs for freedom and struggles with the responsibilities that come with it. For example, I see people longing for a sense of freedom from fear yet find it hard to embrace the compassion that would mitigate the fear.

But is there a longing that comes from an even deeper place than even the political and social patterns of a society? This little essay is about the longing that fills people not because it is a particular moment in or condition of their lives or a general feeling of need within a society, but from somewhere universal.

When I asked a young woman of my acquaintance about longing, she was very quick to respond. She said, “We are longing for a sense of purpose and for connections with others – that are meaningful.” What a beautiful summarization that transcends time, political and social patterns and focuses on individuals who one day realize they are unique.

A sense of purpose answers the question of what my uniqueness brings to the world and how I can make my contribution from this uniqueness. Meaningful connections tell us that unique does not have to mean alone, and that there are others who will support us in our uniqueness. Purpose and meaningful connections feel elemental. Society does not have to do a thing to place these longings in the human soul. We are naturally beings of purpose and beings who wish to be with others. We may be unique, but we are not alone in the struggle of life.

Longing is not the same as desire or want. It feels like it comes from a much deeper place than either of them. Perhaps longing is the ‘desire of the heart’ that is spoken of in scripture. Longing is often unnamed. It is often unrecognized. It is always felt.

I’ve never written so far afield from the general topic of riding the current in this blog. However, as I dive deeper and deeper into this topic, I am finding pearls that embellish the earlier thoughts I have had. For example, deciding that you will learn to ride the current is about finding the path to the knowledge you need to be who you are meant to be. Inviting Practice Partners to go along with you is about meaningful connections.

I have been searching for an umbrella under which I can place all the work I am doing – from Riding the Current to Mental Espresso – an umbrella that represents the deepest values I hold. This feels like the place to begin.

When asked how he keeps fresh knowledge flowing into his work, his answer was immediate. “I have a wide ranging curiosity. I look around at a lot of things.” I thought I could see how this would bring fresh knowledge flowing in all the time, but Dennis went on to explain what he meant further through a story.

“One day when my Dad and I were out hunting deer, my Dad said to me, ‘Stop looking for deer.’ Well, I had been looking so hard at every possible place where a deer could be that I thought I was surely doing the right thing. Instead, my father said to just take a walk in the woods and let my mind do what it does well when it doesn’t have to concentrate on one thing – it observes the unusual. When we don’t demand that the mind concentrate on something, it is free to absorb all the subtle signals from its surroundings – a movement, a different color, a sudden noise, a sudden silence. It was then that I began to really hunt for deer.” Today, Dennis says, “We all need to unharness the right brain and take walks and sit quietly – ‘explore the woods.’ In this way, we allow for greater learning.”

What a great metaphor, Dennis. How many of us would find it easier to ‘see the deer’ if we just relaxed and let our brains work as a massive filter of our experiences, of our senses. This is a new way to understand observation.

When was there a time you saw something you weren’t looking for? How did you recognize it?  How might you apply ‘exploring the wood’ in your work?

As Dennis talked, he explained how he knows he has learned something, “I know it when I see a guiding metaphor shift. For example, a colleague once said to me about my teaching, ‘God sends threads to webs begun.’ As soon as I heard this, I began to change the way I taught. If the student doesn’t already have an interest, a base on which to hang what I am talking about, then it won’t stick.” He went on to say, “Now my instruction to students is to come to class with questions. We spend the time with me responding to their questions.” As I listened to Dennis, I realized again how his approach has confirmed something I have always said, namely, that we don’t build without a foundation.

“Language, which not only houses our thoughts but even the potential of our thoughts, in essence consists of dead and living metaphors. Metaphorical perception allows us to understand the nature of one reality by using the perception of a dissimilar reality to provide the necessary light…Our interpretations guide our perceptions more than vice-versa. Debates rarely change the images that guide our behavior. Reflections and conversations are better at changing the guiding metaphors determining our methods and materials…Without conversation and/or reflection, the guiding metaphors are hidden and thus unchangeable.”

As a part of my work on Riding the Current, I defined seven principles of what I call radical learning – learning that is social, sticky, fuel-efficient, and guilt free. (Okay, it’s time for me to blog more on this. Later.) In Rader’s writing, I could see another way to see two of the principles from radical learning – conversation and observation – working together.

First, the conversation principle says that a face to face conversation opens the possibilities for unexpected learning because multiple voices bring more perspectives. I tended to see this as an external activity – creating a space where ideas could mingle, coalesce, and even merge and emerge. Rader describes the interior aspect of conversation that reveals the hidden metaphors that are guiding our individual interpretations.

Second, the observation principle is about becoming aware of what we experience in the world and using that awareness to discover new insights. Thinking in terms of Rader’s guiding metaphors, the observation principle has a new dimension – one of filter. Observation comes in through a ‘lens’ that can change the original sensing. Combining it with conversation where those filters (frameworks, metaphors) can be revealed, enhances the effectiveness of both principles.

I discovered that the seven principles of radical learning must all work together. Rader’s exploration of the guiding metaphor is completely consistent with this, and it helps me explain better why using all the principles creates a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts.

I admit it, I am only a bit more than half way through Rader’s book, but I couldn’t resist sharing this initial insight about guiding metaphors. I’m about to begin the chapter Neurogenic Learning. I can’t wait to see what new insights I gain.

I had an intuitive sense that it was a good idea to give something tangible to those who are trying to make a better life for themselves and their families. Today, I read something that justified this intuitive feeling. World Ark, the magazine of Heifer International, had an article called “Thoughts for the Brain.” The title immediately intrigued me, and I read it. In the midst of the article, I discovered something truly wonderful. Let me tell you about it.

The author, Mike Thompson, was describing a recent trip to Nepal where American interventions are suspect. He was talking with Netra (Maoist Party secretary for the Palpa District of Nepal) who, like many leaders in poverty areas of the world, takes a hard-line, isolationist approach to reform – no help from those outside the borders. Yet in his meeting with Netra, they both arrived at an ah-ha moment. As Mike tells it, “heifer had become an acceptable partner in the future of Nepal, Netra told me, because Heifer is more about putting ‘thoughts in our brains’ than ‘bread in our stomachs.’” ‘Thoughts in our brains” – what a beautiful statement of what can happen.

As the author continued, he spoke of his lesson from meeting with many such leaders in the poverty areas of the world. “What I learned from these incredible people is that they all displayed the three basic traits of an Anywhere Leader: They were Driven for Progress, Sensationally Curious and Vastly Resourceful.”

How many times have I talked about curiosity is a real driver of life long learning – of learning at any time. To see it as one of the characteristics of someone who struggles with the hardest of what life has to give, it says there is no reason not to be constantly – sensationally curious.

What are you curious about today?

We are often entertained during a talk. In fact, we are taught as speakers that we must entertain as we convey our content. We know it is so, because when we are relaxed, more can be taken in. But does it get taken in as much as we think? I thought of a recent show I watched on TV. I loved it because it moved so fast, I was unable to move from my seat or I would miss something important. Yet, did I remember it? Not really.

Okay, my lesson has become – silence teaches.

I’ve been writing on the topic of bringing fresh knowledge into day-to-day life for about 5 years. As I interview people on the subject and write about them in this blog, I love the variations I discover. I know that these small variations are helping people in a lot of places around the globe find new ideas about how to continue their learning as part of their day to day life. Now, I have discovered something more than a variation. I have discovered yet another way in which to learn. Yes, I have talked about taking time to think, taking real time out and letting your thoughts bubble around and percolate, getting a full night’s rest to let things get sorted out. But now I see that learning begins in a flash of silence.

Tell me about your experiences of those momentary flashes when something clicks in the midst of a talk, performance, or conversation.

The opportunity to learn and explore new things is all around you.