Start a Bigger Thinker’s List: “What I Want to Learn”

I have begun to read The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. I’m only about seventy pages into it, but I can already tell it will be one of those books that really gets me to re-think about things that I have come to believe I’ve already thought through. It’s a book that is telling me how wrong I am on virtually every page, and I’m okay with that. In fact, I’m thrilled. Ferriss can give my brain as many kick-starts as he wants.

You can never get too lazy about thinking. Thinking is the humility muscle in your brain that lies somewhere in-between those other two halves some people talk about. Far as I can tell, there’s no learning without thinking. I call it the ‘humility muscle’ because it can handle that bully we all have inside us called our ego.

Now thinking can be laborious and joyless, or it can be liberating and jubilant. So far, Ferriss is giving me the liberating and jubilant kind of thinking, and I really, really love it!

In what I’ve read so far, there’s been one thought in particular that keeps bugging me though, so much so that I had to put the book aside for moment to write this for you.

Ferris says that “most people will never know what they want” and the more I think about this, I realize how right he is about that.

Most of us struggle with our goals because we are really terrible at dreaming up the good stuff. We just copy-cat the dreams which currently seem to be popular with most of the world, even though they don’t keep us up at night chomping at the bit for them. If we actually manage to nail them, we then wonder why achieving our goals is kind of boring, and not all they’re cracked up to be.

I run into this within my coaching business when I challenge people with ‘Imi ola, the Hawaiian value that urges us to seek (‘imi) our best possible life (ola). I ask them to describe what their best possible life would be, and what should be a really easy question turns out to be pretty difficult for them.

Why is that? Why is dreaming about what we want, and learning to articulate it so hard for us? Why can’t we think bigger and brighter, and more lick-our-lips eagerly about what we want?

Now consider this, written by a good friend of mine, a very wise, wily Coyote kind of guy;

Learning and living are the same. When you stop learning, you start to die a little every day. Strong scientific evidence links between brain cells can regrow at any age if you give them some exercise. Your brain is a case of "use it or lose it."
—Adrian Savage

I agree with Adrian, and here’s my theory: If we can dream bigger about the things we want to learn about, our dreams for our best possible lives will get better too. We’ll be more daring, break some rules, continually ask “Why not?” and go for it in more joyful, jubilant ways.

How about testing this theory with me?

Do you know what you want to learn about? Can you write a list out for yourself? What would be on it?

• How about speed-reading?
• Another language … something exotic like Etruscan or Patois?
• Can you draw a family tree? How about genealogy, or about parenting step-children?
• How about Paleontology, or making life-sized dioramas?
• Appreciative inquiry or Stand-up comedy?
• Bungee jumping or para-sailing?
• How to make a salt-water fish tank, or the world’s largest ant farm?
• Needlepoint? Ice-carving with a chainsaw? Making spun sugar? Mud wrestling?

You can do me better, I know you can.

Start a Bigger Thinker’s List. Call it “What I Want to Learn for No Reason Other Than the Joy of it.” Keep a slip of paper with you for the next week, and just write down all the intriguing ideas which come your way. Just one guideline: It has to make you smile broadly or giggle like a silly child.

Better yet, don’t wimp on this with a slip of paper. Go get a flipchart sized page and doodle your list all over it. Roll it up and carry it around with you with a bunch of colored sharpies. Be brave: Show it to people and ask them if they can be crazier than you. Laugh about it together.

And for goodness sake, do NOT begin to list any reasons why you can’t learn any of the things on your list, for you can learn them all. Remember that can’t usually means won’t.

Dream like a Bigger Thinker dreams.

Are you with me?

Comments

[Adam Kayce : Monk At Work]

I'm with you, Rosa!

Maybe this should go "one better" already... how about making this a meme? I'd love to inspire other people to dream bigger, and I think it could be contagious (my Learning Edge meme sure spread, and it's right in the same vein as this idea).

How's this: I'll come up with a Dream Big list, post about it and point people here, and see if I can inspire a few more people to get out of their boxes (which, by the way, is one of the things I'm enjoying about Tim's book, too — challenging my assumptions, and daring to dream).

[Rosa Say]

Hana hou Adam (work-hana at it again-hou)!

Yes, let's revisit your Learning Edge and ramp it up with our mutual Tim-Ferriss-as-catalyst reading! I love that idea!

JJLers, here is Adam's Learning Edge meme:
http://monkatwork.com/2007/06/25/whats-your-learning-edge/

[Dean Boyer]

Rosa,

Here's a marvelous quote to encourage this spirit of childhood!

Walk in the rain, jump in mud puddles, collect rocks, rainbows and roses, smell flowers, blow bubbles, stop along the way, build sandcastles, say hello to everyone, go barefoot, go on adventures, act silly, fly kites, have a merry heart, talk with animals, sing in the shower, read childrens' books, take bubble baths, get new sneakers, hold hands and hug and kiss, dance, laugh and cry for the health of it, wonder and wander around, feel happy and precious and innocent, feel scared, feel sad, feel mad, give up worry and guilt and shame, say yes, say no, say the magic words, ask lots of questions, ride bicycles, draw and paint, see things differently, fall down and get up again, look at the sky, watch the sun rise and sun set, watch clouds and name their shapes, watch the moon and stars come out, trust the universe, stay up late, climb trees, daydream, do nothing and do it very well, learn new stuff, be excited about everything, be a clown, enjoy having a body, listen to music, find out how things work, make up new rules, tell stories, save the world, make friends with the other kids on the block, and do anything else that brings more happiness, celebration, health, love, joy, creativity, pleasure, abundance, grace, self-esteem, courage, balance, spontaneity, passion, beauty, peace, relaxation, communication and life energy to...all living beings on this planet.

-Bruce Williamson, It's Never Too Late To Have A Happy Childhood, 1987

[Rosa Say]

That IS a marvelous quote Dean, I love it! Thank you so very much for sharing it with us.

I'm thinking it would be a pretty awesome reminder to have scrolling across my computer screen when it's on powersave mode, getting me to sit back and not take myself too seriously.

If we all DO look at it as a list to live up to, there will be a lot of joyful days in store for us!