In the Shadow of the Tree

“The one who plants trees, knowing that he
 (his gendering not mine, I would insert they)
will never sit in their shade.
Has at least started to understand the meaning of life.” Rabindranath Tagore

This inspirational quote got me thinking about the process of learning a new skill. Two things occurred to me about the acquisition of a new skill. There is our interface and difficulty with learning itself and the underlying components and depth of the skill itself. The quote made me ponder when we learn a new skill, we really have no idea how that skill will be utilised across the length and breadth of our lives. Nor do we know how the act of learning it will impact on us either.

What I mean is that sure we will use the skill in the short term for its intended purpose and desire to learn it. But as life progresses, the underlying facets of the skill may bear fruit in unexpected ways.  For example, we may learn how to ski but we have no idea what the deeper learning of that skill set will provide us and more over the difficulty we are confronted with when we try to learn the new skill.

We are usually confronted by something unexpected when learning a new skill. These ‘confrontations’ usually have to do with us, not the skill itself. Learning a new skill will always challenge us. Meeting challenges head on is not always comfortable and could be thought of as an opportunity to get outside our comfort zone. When we are outside that comfort zone great stuff happens!

"On the heels of your comfort zone is complacency and
on the heels of complacency is destruction"
Noble Gibbens.

The calm I feel now when trying something new is exciting. Knowing I will be challenged learning a new skill and having no idea what this will provide me to my future self is a form of Zen.