It looks like one of the themes we will carry into 2013 as a Sangha is Learning to Love Learning. I have been playing with it for a few weeks and it is extraordinary. Here is one of my favorite insights so far: Keep it fun! In all the areas I have taken on to learn (and when I look at it closely I see that EVERYTHING I am doing all day every day is learning) a wonderful pattern emerged. I go along for a while, having fun taking in information, seeing new things, and then sometimes I will come to a juncture where it seems the information is no longer landing anywhere or there is something puzzling I am not seeing. As a student in school I learned to meet that place with effort, time to try harder. Watching closely I started to see that right in that place conditioning comes in to attempt a take-over. Soon the learning is about should, getting somewhere, meeting a standard, not actually about learning at all.
Practicing with the spirit of inquiry I decided to try out a change in behavior. What if, when I stopped having fun, I went on to something else or another aspect of the project? And I discovered that it works! I can return to that place even a few minutes later and often there is clarity and ease where there had been effort and struggle! Fun is a great learning tool!
GasshÅ,
Jen