The Two Things I Know About Designing an Adult Curriculum in 2019.
This is an unparalleled era for learning. Information has never been in greater abundance. So the questions are: What are we learning? Who are we learning from? And, are we even learning?
Making the most of the opportunities we have is our responsibility. We are living through the informational and technological revolutions simultaneously. It is our duty to maximize our development during such a powerful time.
However, consuming information should be a mindful and not a mindless process. With so much knowledge and content available our ability to filter and decide on what to allow in our minds is itself a skill to learn.
Here are two things I’ve learned about learning in our modern age.
1.) No matter how much we want to, we can’t learn everything from everyone.
There are hundreds if not thousands of “thought leaders”. Some self-proclaim that title, and some seem to adequately fall into that broad category by being on the leading edge of content and conversations in their primary fields of expertise.
We have to pick and choose our teachers carefully. Not only to ensure we are learning the right thing from the right person but to avoid the pitfalls of overwhelm. With a thirst for knowledge and an abundance of options, we must make sure not to select “all of the above.” I’ve tried, and I’ll explain a bit about how that worked out for me.
In 2015 I was in a huge transition in my life, coming to the conclusions that formed a base for what I’m currently trying to build. I focused a lot on diversifying my skill set and knowledge outside of the industry I grew up in. I was a sponge. One thing I didn’t know was that a sponge can become saturated, and has a maximum absorption potential at any one moment. I didn’t know that until I reached that point.
I aimed to improve my life through focusing heavily on personal development. I became focused on increasing my understanding of the psychology of performance and success.
Lots of people provide content in this conversation, so I tasted things on the buffet. Pretty soon my plate was full and began to overflow.
Here’s what that looked like for me in 2015.
I followed some of my tried and true teachers like Tim Ferriss (Tim Ferriss) [see the day I met him], but added in:
Brendon Burchard (Brendon Burchard)
Gary Vaynerchuk (Gary Vaynerchuk)
James Altucher (James Altucher)
That is a dream team of quality mentors, but it didn’t work for me. Each of them is extremely prolific in creating content to learn from. The number of emails, podcasts, articles and notifications that pop up when you enter their ecosystems is overwhelming — especially combined.
I would have so many great podcasts I could choose from, and so much content to sort through it was actually causing me some anxiety.
I even felt guilty about not reading or absorbing everything that they put out. Like I wasn’t doing a good job supporting them or something.
So I learned that in today's attention deficit marketplace we need to narrow our focus. There are so many people doing great work, but saying yes to all of them at the same time does not help us achieve what we are working towards any faster. It might actually slow us down.
If we want to learn from everyone we need to make a plan, and not end up swamped in potential knowledge without a strategy to retain and utilize it.
2.) We owe it to ourselves to design a curriculum in areas we are passionate about.
We need a plan. Countless courses, videos, articles, books, and podcasts are at our fingertips. A segmented and intentionally designed action plan to decide what we want to learn and from whom, and in what timeframe.
In this era of abundant potential learning, we must identify specific areas to focus our attention. As we grow our competence in the fields of our choice we can deepen our fascination and commitment to learning and it becomes a perpetual loop.
Passionate get’s tossed around a lot, and so many people are perpetually enquiring about “how do I find my passion”. Passion has a strong correlative relationship with fascination. When we find subjects we are deeply curious about and fascinated by those are areas we can cultivate passion in.
What are we curious about? Who are the best in the world at that? How can I learn from them?
In the past these questions used to involve large amounts of time to even establish initial answers to. Let alone how much time it would take to follow up on that and begin the actual study.
But, now?
More and more people each day can access the internet and all the freedom of information that entails. Connection speeds are increasing and so is computer processing power. This means once we make the decision about an area we want to direct our time towards, we can nearly instantaneously be connected with a world-class teacher and learning.
This ease of access can end up being highly distracting unless we define what we are seeking before wading into the digital stream.
We need a curriculum of exactly what we are specifically fascinated by. We need to know where to find the best possible teachers or mentors, and what benefits we are working to extract. Deciding how much time we want to invest in each specific area is also an essential part of any plan we devise.
How much time each month? Each week? Each day?
Being intentional about learning is called for now more than ever. Without designing a plan in advance we face the potential for aimless efforts not getting us anywhere.
The learning process is different for everyone, but it should be enjoyable. Once we decide who we want to learn from, and what we want to learn over what timespan the rest is whatever works best for us. Maybe it is textbooks. Maybe it is live in-person training. Maybe it’s video or audio.
The methods of learning can suit our inclinations but making the important decisions up front matters just as much.
Who do you want to learn from? What do you want to learn? When are you learning it?
Learning and seeing improvement in areas that actually fascinate us feels so good. My hope is that more and more people will fall in love with learning as I have and reap the numerous benefits.
I wish you well in your studies.
This is the 86th installment of Writing Wednesday. A commitment to myself to actually pursue my dreams of becoming a writer. I have resumed this practice after almost an entire years absence.
I am a writer.
Let me know what you think, and follow my journey on Instagram/Twitter (@multitude27)
