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The Art of Learning and Unlearning.
Any act at any time is a result of
personality, circumstances, learning, and unlearning.
One’s
personality is created while growing up. The circumstantial factors will have
to be dealt with when they surface. But learning and unlearning are lengthy
and ongoing processes. And very confusing and personal ones too!
For, as many
different teachers as one will encounter in life, as many different teachings
will one come across as well.
There will be valuable teachings about the
advantages of being thoughtful and conservative. And there will be valuable
teachings about the advantages of being fast and radical.
There will
be valuable teachings about the advantages of organization. And there will be
valuable teachings about the advantages of chaos.
There will be valuable
teachings about the advantages of being assertive. And there will be valuable
teachings about the advantages of being introverted.
There will be
lessons that preach the quality of diversity. And there will be lessons that
preach the quality of homogeneity.
There is sense in selectively learning
all these things, as much as there is sense in selectively unlearning all
these things.
How, then, should one know which lessons are acceptable and
which are not? How should one know which lessons should be preserved and
which ones should be discarded? No direct answer is possible to that, as it
all, again, depends on one’s circumstances and perceptions. Different
situations may
require entirely opposite approaches for succeeding, while
different perceptions may lead different people to make different selections
of approaches for similar circumstances.
The art of learning is to
know how to be selective. The criteria for selectivity are nurtured by one’s
personality. One’s personality, finally, is determined by one’s character,
culture, gender and experiences.
No one will therefore be able to provide
another with guidelines for the levels or criteria of selecting what parts to
learn and what parts to unlearn. It all lies in the center of one’s own
being, along with one’s value system, which will tell one “this is what I
will remember; this is what I will forget; this is what I will apply; and
this is what I will discard.”
Whether, then, one decides to immerse
into business, engineering, writing, healing, law-enforcing, or serving in
any other way: one will instinctively unpack the perceived proper set of
learned minus unlearned behaviors, combined with the perceived proper set of
natural behaviors, and one will apply this blend to one’s best
capacities.
This, may serve as the proof that any act at any time is a
result of personality, circumstances, learning, and unlearning.
It has
been this way so far; it will be this way forever.
Joan Marques,
Ed.D.
Burbank, May 8,
2004
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About the
Author:
Joan Marques emigrated from Suriname, South America, to California,
U.S., in 1998. She holds a doctorate in Organizational Leadership, a Master’s
in
Business Administration, and is currently a university instructor
in Business and Management in Burbank, California. You may visit her web
sites at http://www.joanmarques.com
and
http://www.spiritcounts.com
Joan's
manual "Feel Good About Yourself," a six part series to get you over the
bumps in life and onto success, can be purchased and downloaded at:
http://www.non-books.com/FeelGoodSeries.html
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