Learning Anything, Any Time, Anywhere
“You can learn new things at any time in your life if you’re willing to be a beginner. If you learn to like being a beginner, the whole world opens up to you.” Author Barbara Sher
Once upon a time, a lady reached the ripe age of 102. That seemed an enviable achievement so folks where she lived called the local newspaper and TV station to tell them about Hannah. Dutifully, they sent their reporters and camera persons to document the event.
Hannah was all gussied up in a flowered dress with a huge pink carnation corsage pinned on her bosom. A pink frosted cake with umpty ump candles on it sat on a table festooned with candy pink flowers. Pink punch awaited the photo op, as they say in The Media. Finally, the moment arrived. Cameras were in place, notepads flipped open. The old lady shifted in her wheelchair (also trimmed with pink carnations). She peered through the top of her bifocals and stared at the whoop to do going on around her.
Finally, the questions started. Everyone was still, awaiting every syllable. Where was she born? No reply. When was she born? Her eyes blinked. How pretty the pink flowers were; was she having a good time? Again, no answer came forth. The media folk were beginning to sweat. It looked like it might be a Non interview.
Then the question they were all waiting for. To what do you attribute your long life, Mrs. Smith? This time, the frail old lady drew herself up straight in her chair, adjusted her glasses on her small nose, and in a clear, unfaltering voice replied.
“I drank a little, I danced a lot, I had great sex and mostly, I learned something new every day. Which I wish the folks here did because then they’d know that I hate birthday parties – avoided ‘em all my life; I hate having my picture taken with phony politicians I wouldn’t know if I fell over ‘em, and most of all, I hate all these damned pink flowers. Do I look like I’m dead and laid out for viewing?”
Now that is what I call a real paradigm shift. Anyone reading Hannah’s interview may have had a sudden and very different view of the aged.
Have you ever learned something that made you unexpectedly see things or people in an entirely new way? That’s a paradigm shift and it’s a gift that comes with learning.
Meditation for the Day
Each day we live, we learn. If we open our eyes and our minds, our reward will be to see the world around us from a new perspective.
Action for the Day
Today, I’ll live every moment to the fullest. I will learn something new by accident and something new that I choose to learn. Mostly, I’ll stay open to the possibility of a paradigm shift in my thinking.
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