Mindful or Mindless - continued...

As a leader, have you overlearned some of the basics of your role to the point where you do your work 'mindlessly'?

When Practice Makes Imperfect
(...thoughts from Ellen Langer...)


- One of the most cherished myths in education or any kind of training is that in order to learn a skill one must practice it to the point of doing it without thinking. 

- When we drill ourselves in a certain skill so that it becomes second nature, does this lead to performing the skill mindlessly?

- Does it make sense to freeze our understanding of the skill before we try it out in different contexts and, at various stages, adjust it to our own strengths and experiences? 

- If we learn the basics but do not overlearn them, we can vary them as we change or as the situation changes.

- Perhaps one could say that for everyone there are certain basics, but that there is no such thing as the basics.

- ...experts at anything become expert in part by varying those same basics.   

From: The Power of Mindful Learning by Ellen J. Langer
Published by: Da Capo Press

Mindful or Mindless?

As a leader, are you mindful or mindless?

A mindful approach to any activity has three characteristics: the continuous creation of new categories; openness to new information; and an implicit awareness of more than one perspective.  Mindlessness, in contrast, is characterized by an entrapment in old categories; by automatic behaviour that precludes attending to new signals; and by action that operates from a single perspective.  Being mindless, colloquially speaking, is like being on automatic pilot.

From: The Power of Mindful Learning by Ellen J. Langer
Published by: Da Capo Press