Learning is not attained by chance; it must be sought for with ardor and diligence.
-Abigail Adams
Hello, welcome to Episode 16: The Great Learning
Here at A New Order of Things, we look to gain knowledge by researching and tying often disparate ideas together. In this episode, we look to various ideas across various cultures and times to gain knowledge on how to learn. This episode is looking at how we can approach learning better.
In a future episode, we will dive into techniques to add to those of this episode-specific learning in academic circles.
In Episode 14, titled Creative Thinking, we dove into some ideas from a book titled Soul of the Samurai which is a collection of writings from two Zen masters and translated by Thomas Cleary.
This episode we are going to kick off our discussion on The Great Learning with another section from Soul of the Samurai.
This time the author is Yagyu Munenori (1571-1646) who was the Emperor of Japan’s personal Combatives instructor. His writing, Martial Arts: The Book of Family Traditions contains three sections or books. Let’s dive in to Book 1: The Killing Sword: Section: The Great Learning.
It is said that The Great Learning is the gateway to elementary learning. When you go to a house, first you go through the gate; thus the gate is an indication that you have arrived at the house. Going through this gate, you enter the house and meet the host.
(EDDIE’S COMMENTARY)
The Great Learning, or Diagaku in Japanese, is one of a four-book Confucian text. When the Sword Master speaks of entering the house and meeting the Host, he is referencing a famous line from The Great Learning which is, “The Way of Great learning is in clarifying enlightened virtue.” Simply meaning, “Clarifying the mind.”
Learning is the gate to the attainment of the Way. You get to the Way by going through this gate. Therefore, learning is the gate, not the house. When you see the gate, don’t take it for the house. The house is inside, past the gate.
Since learning is a gate when you read books, don’t think this is the way books are a gate to get to the Way. Therefore, many people remain ignorant of the Way no matter how much they study, or how many words they know. Even if you can read fluently according to the commentaries of the ancients. As long as you are ignorant of the principles, you cannot make the Way your own.
(EDDIE’S COMMENTARY)
In 1500s feudal Japan, a house having a gate was a fortified place, not a little white picket fence and honeysuckle-covered arch to enter through. To enter the gate meant you were allowed to enter, you had a reason for entering. Then, the path to the house required intent to proceed. There would have been stairways, gardens, fountains, and ponds on the way to the house door. Once you made it to the door of the house, the host would be there to greet you, and welcome you to the house.
The trip from the gate to the house is learning. Opening the book, or accepting the desire to learn a topic, is passing through the gate. Taking in the details, interacting with the ideas as you meander your way to the house is learning.
Just reading a book is not true learning. Knowing words is not learning. As we will see in a moment, learning is far more involved than reading. Or listening to audiobooks…Do not get me started on that!
Even so, to attain the Way without learning is difficult. Yet it is impossible to say that someone understands the Way just because he is learned and articulate. There are some people who accord with the Way spontaneously without learning how.
(EDDIE’S COMMENTARY)
Simply, there are some who take to certain topics quickly, almost effortlessly. While others require intent.
The Great Learning speaks of consummating knowledge and perfecting things. consummating knowledge means thoroughly knowing the principles of everything that people in the world know. Perfecting things means that when you thoroughly know the principles of everything, then you know everything and can do everything. When knowledge is consummated, things get done too. When you do not know the principles nothing at all comes to fruition.
(EDDIE’S COMMENTARY)
Once an idea, system, or process is so well understood that you do not need to think about it to perform it, you have consummated the knowledge. You have reached the house.
In all things uncertainty exists because of not knowing, being doubtful. Those things stay in your mind. When the principle is clarified. Nothing stays in your mind. This is called consummating knowledge and perfecting things. Once there is nothing on your mind everything becomes easy to do.
(EDDIE’S COMMENTARY)
In Episode 14- Creative Thinking we discussed how confusion, laziness, and/or ignorance lead us to stagnate on a single thought or idea? Learning is hard work. Reading is not. Just because you have read about a topic does not mean you understand it. Thus, you will stagnate on it.
For this reason, the practice of all the arts is to clear away what is on your mind. At first, you don’t know anything, so you don’t have any uncertainty in mind. Then, when you enter into that study, there is something on your mind and you are inhibited by that. So everything becomes hard to do.
When the object of your study leaves your mind entirely and practice also disappears. Then when you perform the art in which you’re engaged you accomplish the techniques easily without being inhibited by concern over what you’ve learned, yet without deviating from what you’ve learned. This is spontaneous accord with learning, without subjective awareness to do so. This is how the science of learning is to be understood.
I have spoken about Josh Waitzkin on numerous occasions. He understands learning. So much so, he has written a book about it, The Art of Learning. Josh has also created a non-profit organization supplying students, teachers, and parents with resources to assist in helping students truly understand what they are learning, navigating the path from the gate to the house if you will.
I am going to share a few quick ideas from Josh outlined in The Art of Learning,
Josh Waitzkin
We must Master the Fundamentals (Chapters 3, 11)
It is most effective to launch into the learning process by studying a discipline’s most fundamental principles. A devotion to mastering the nuances of these basics builds the foundation required for more complex understanding; creative bursts of inspiration; and higher levels of achievement, which result from an interplay between knowledge, intuition, and creativity. By studying and deeply internalizing core concepts we develop our brain in ways that allow us to achieve a more penetrating understanding of not just one subject or practice but also all others we choose to undertake. (Munger’s Latticework) As we immerse ourselves in doing what it takes to absorb and build on fundamentals, we experience first-hand the joy of learning and reinforce for ourselves its value. Allowing ourselves to grasp the intrinsic benefit of personal development through what we do to achieve it enhances our motivation and equips us to take learning further.
We must be Breaking Down Walls (Chapters 7, 9, 10, 18)
Themes that arise in one area of our personal lives will also surface in other areas—all aspects of life are interconnected. The ability to learn and perform in consistently effectual ways is therefore impacted by our general state of mind. It is vital that we unearth the psychological patterns and emotional responses that get in the way of our successes and take our weaknesses on. (Break biases, that is a topic for a future podcast) By bringing awareness to the threads connecting mind and action, we can break down the walls between the disparate parts of our lives that we have mentally built up and take corrective steps to transform all our weaknesses into strengths.
Push through The Middle Way: Navigating Greyness (Chapters 9, 19)
To maximize learning and use the knowledge we gain to perform at a high level, we must be willing to engage in a process that pushes us to the outer edges of our abilities yet does not stretch us so thinly that we run the risk of breaking down. Ideally, we will allow the bar to move a bit higher with 17 on each step we take along this balanced middle road—just enough to engage our capacities fully and let us experience some success. This approach can spur us on to additional growth and wins. In order to strike a balance between pushing ourselves forward and preserving a sense of wholeness, we must be willing to let go of our prior notions of adequacy and pursue a strategy of growth that upholds our unique learning styles as well as the passions that give expression to who we are.
Beginner’s Mind
Beginner’s Mind (or Shoshin) is a term used to describe the mindset of a true beginner.
When you are new to something, you don’t know anything about it. This is like standing in the street, looking at the high walls and gate around the house. Preparing yourself to enter.
I suggest you adopt the unique mindset of a Beginner’s mind.
In this state of mind, you are:
- Free of preconceptions of how anything works. (no biases)
- Free of expectations about what will happen. (I am going to go where the learning takes me)
- Filled with curiosity to understand things more deeply. (it has to be something you are interested in)
- Open to a world of possibilities, since you don’t yet know what is or isn’t possible.
Children are natural at this because they’re always beginners at something. But as you get older, it’s easy to lose touch with the qualities of mind that once came so naturally.
The Curse of Knowledge
Most people spend their lives trying to become experienced in a field, expert in a subject area, or skilled at a craft.
Beginner’s Mind seems to run in opposition to that trajectory. Because of this, the idea can feel uncomfortable!
Why would you abandon what you know about the world, even for a moment?
Isn’t it better to have expertise, knowledge, and understanding?
Experience is indeed a wonderful thing. It often helps you do things at a higher level.
Shunryu Suzuki wrote:
“If your mind is empty…it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.”
Benefits of Beginner’s Mind
Cultivating a beginner’s mind gives you the opportunity to see the world around you with fresh eyes.
The benefits of this mindset cut across many factors of life, and contribute to:
- Deeper Gratitude: It’s easy to lose sight of the many good things in life that lift you up. By seeing your life from a fresh perspective, you can appreciate what you might otherwise take for granted.
- More Creativity: When you work in a particular field, and see a similar set of problems time and time again, habits of thinking become engrained. But deliberately experiencing a problem with the mind of a beginner can provide a fresh perspective on existing challenges. You’ll explore opportunities that you didn’t previously consider
- Greater Intention: When you’re familiar with something, it’s easy to go into “autopilot”. A beginner’s mind helps you slow you down to see what you’re doing in greater clarity, and avoid the drawbacks of mindlessly “going through the motions.”
- More Fun: The beginner’s mind helps you re-acquaint yourself with the interesting aspects of everything you do. Relive the reasons why you started doing those things in the first place!
- More Playfulness: When did life become so serious? Adopting the mindset of a child can help you get playful, curious, and expansive with whatever subject or activity you’re focused on.
- Greater Wonder: The world is a magnificent place, full of beauty.
10 Exercises to Develop Beginner’s Mind
When you’re used to knowing what you know, thinking like a beginner can be surprisingly challenging!
- Identify your expectations, and flip them around
What have you assumed to be true about this experience or topic? What would happen if you did the opposite? - Go slowly
With known topics, you tend to operate on autopilot. By deliberately slowing down, you can force yourself to experience each step of a given activity more deeply. Physically slow down your movements, and your mind tends to follow. - Avoid pre-judgement
Can you really know that it will happen in the way you assumed it will? - Break the topic down into building blocks
Try to distill the topic or exercise into a simpler form. - Teach it to a five-year-old
- Eliminate “should” from your vocabulary
Let go of any expected outcome to remain open to broader possibilities. - Detach from your ego’s desire to be seen as an expert
Focus instead on seeing reality as it is, without bias. - Get fully present to the experience at hand
Open your senses to what you’re experiencing, as if you’d never experienced it before. What do you see/hear/smell/feel/taste? What patterns exist? What is confusing? (Why?) What makes sense? (Why?)
Begin Again, Begin Again
“We begin with beginner’s mind, and then, if we’re lucky, we deepen it, or return to it.”
At the onset of a new experience, it’s impossible not to have the mindset of a beginner.
But as time moves along, these attitudes drift away. As knowledge and understanding root themselves in your mind, your aperture of consideration narrows.
Cultivating Beginner’s Mind is a way to reverse this limiting tendency.
Seeing things anew brings fresh perspective to old sights, and opens up a world of intrigue and possibility in every day.
The best part about a beginner’s mind is that it’s always accessible. Every week, every day, and every moment is an opportunity to begin again.
Scott Young
10 Ways You Can Use ChatGPT to Learn Better
May 2023
After receiving dozens of emails from my audience on how they have been personally using ChatGPT to learn, I’ve compiled some tips with some of the most common suggestions.
1. Create your own Socratic tutor.
By far, the most common use readers reported was using an LLM as a personal tutor.
Asking ChatGPT to explain tricky concepts, unfamiliar code or problems seems like an area where LLMs might do alright. And the only reasonable substitute (a human expert) is notoriously expensive and in short supply.
If you do this in conjunction with a class or textbook, the risks of mistakes also seem attenuated since you still have a primary source to compare against. Challenge explanations that don’t jive with what you’ve read in the book rather than taking everything the AI says at face value.
3. Generate summaries of longer texts.
Summaries are another area where LLMs seem to excel. Consumer applications already exist for generating summaries of journal articles or research topics.
Several readers said they were using these AI tools to provide digests of their substantial reading material, helping them keep atop new developments in their field.
Good summaries, especially those fine-tuned to your particular needs, might be a good way of navigating the large information loads we often face in knowledge work. You could use it to help prioritize which documents to read in-depth or do a first pass organizing unfamiliar material.
Some Things NOT To Do
1. Don’t expect AI to get facts right.
2. Don’t expect AI to get citations right.
3. Don’t expect AI to get the math right.
Charlie Munger on Continuous Learning
“You will not make any significant advances in life based on what you already know.”
“I constantly see people rise in life who were not the smartest, sometimes not even the most diligent, but they are learning machines. They go to bed every night a little wiser than they were when they got up, and boy does that have it help, particularly when you have a long run ahead of you.”
“The reason to keep learning is simple: the world keeps changing and your competitors keep learning.”
“And the way the world is constructed in this field, you have to keep learning, because the world keeps changing and your competitors keep learning.”
“I think that a life properly lived is just learn, learn, learn all the time. And I think Berkshire’s gained enormously from these investment decisions by learning through a long, long period.”
What does Charlie Munger say to learn?
“You need the models—not just from one or two disciplines, but also from all the important disciplines. You need the best 100 or so models from microeconomics, physiology, psychology particularly, elementary mathematics, hard science and engineering (and so on). You need not be an expert, but you must learn ‘em right. You don’t have to be a huge expert in any of those fields. All you have got to do is take the really big ideas and learn them early and well.”
Here are two more of Charlie’s quotes you can take with you. One for today…
“If you just get up every morning and keep plugging and have some discipline and keep learning…it’s amazing how it works.”
One for tonight.
“And if I enjoy learning it, I regard it as important, because I think that’s what you’re here for, is to go to bed every night a little wiser than you were when you got up.”
Well, I think we have discussed the basic points of Great Learning. I guarantee I will be returning to the topic of learning skills in future episodes, and diving deeper into these ideas and real-world observations and how they are pertinent within our lives, businesses, and organizations today.
Links to all the quoted resources are in the show notes and in the transcript on my website, Eddiekillian.com
Join me next Tuesday as we continue to travel the path of what is difficult, perilous, and uncertain as we explore introducing A New Order of Things.
I am your host, Eddie Killian. And this concludes Episode 16.
Links
Josh Waitzkin: https://www.joshwaitzkin.com
The Art of Learning Project: The Art of Learning Project – Start Your Journey
Scott Young’s Blog: https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2023/05/02/chatgpt-learning-tips/
References
Kaufman, P. D. (2005). Poor Charlie’s Almanac: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger. Overland Park: Walsworth Publishing Company.
Munenori, Y. (2003). Martial Arts: The Book of Family Traditions. In T. Cleary, The Soul of the Samurai (pp. 8-99). North Clarendon, VT: Tuttle Publishing.
Waitzkin, J. (2008). The Art of Learning. New York: Free Press.
Eddie Killian 