Barriers to Learning

To be successful in life, it is imperative to keep learning every day and keep honing your talents and work on self-development. We all are aware of this fact and know the importance of self development, but due to our neurological conditioning and habit we tend to ignore this and by the time we realize the same we had already missed some great opportunities which came our way. We tend to be complacent and do not want to put ourselves into discomfort and are happy to lead the life we are leading. This lead to stagnation over a period both in professional as well as personal life. In this blog, I would like to touch upon  few of the barriers to learning and approach to overcome the same.

There are four barriers to learning and the same is described below:

1. Phenomenon of discounting : When you see the idea which is different, you tend to discount the same i.e. you quickly react as this idea though good will not work out, because you cling to your believes which you have gathered in our journey so far. Rather than embracing different ideas, you tend to ignore them because for you to adopt the same you have to leave your safe harbor of the known. At times you are not open to new ideas also because you believe that you will lose control of the situation due to fear of insecurity. This is a myth, you should embrace new ideas and not discount it, who knows this might be a game changer idea that would elevate and make you a better person professionally as well as personally.

2. Low level of presence: Your presence is most important at that moment. Your presence is scattered and not focused to take yourself and your business to next level.   Technology fragments the attention we pay each other with every text message beep and social media alert. With technology, information flow is very fast and there is no time zone restrictions thus making it harder to feel empathy or use your social skills to advantage. Chemistry happens when you pay full attention, never when you are distracted, so always be present in the moment.

3. Intellectually closed: The more successful you become, you cling to, you fall in love with your current ways of thinking and your current performance and that is the beginning of the downfall. You tend to get complacent and you do not challenge yourself because you think you are the best and hence do not embrace new ideas and you start taking things for granted, whether your job, your customers, your family and so on.  For a sustained success, you have to be willing to be disruptive and look at providing something disruptive to your customers and take yourself to the next level of success.

4. Fear of failure: Its subconscious, fear of failure is sabotaging your way of thinking, you do not accept the idea which you know may create a big difference because your mind becomes louder than your thoughts. Your mind has got conditioned in such a way that you relate all such situation with some lessons you have been taught, may be at your school, by your parents, by your peers and hence you fear accepting any idea which is unconventional.

To overcome the above barriers, you need to construct your outer environment which would be an enabler in building a life full of learning. There will always be people around you who will knock you down if you give them a chance i.e. you are knocked down by others only when you yourself give a permission for this. The more enablers of mediocrity you adopt the less you will be enabled to perform at world class level. The more you clean out the mess around you, you will fly and become successful. The more you are committed to excellence, the more you will move away from mediocrity. The more you play at wow, the more you have faith in your vision.

Always think of creating a difference. Differentiation is the key mantra, the more you leave the herd, the more you move away from the crowd, more you look different and more are the chances for your success. All great people were misunderstood.

However, whenever someone takes this path, there are frustrating moments too. The more you think different, the more you feel frustrated because you would move at a different pace as compared to others. Because your vision would be big and there would be certain systemic and cultural limitation which would prevent you from being world class. Be persistent and passionate about what you are doing, keep a never give up attitude. There are many examples from history, the likes of Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison, Nelson Mandela, all were focused and persistent with their thoughts. 

You will also face criticism on the way because criticism is a defense mechanism thrown at you by people who were knocked down and does not believe in change, they will mock you, they will laugh at you and pull you down, knock you down. But you need to keep your focus and be persistent with your thoughts to achieve your ultimate goal, your ultimate dream, be focused. While it might sound repetitive, but repetition is essential to get the focus on what needs to be done.

Always be dis-satisfied. Be content but never be satisfied. Imagine where would be the world be if we did not have people who were dis-satisfied. If everyone is satisfied with himself, there would be no heroes. If you invest in learning and keep working on your personal development you will learn new ideas that would elevate your game and make you a better person.

There is a saying, "Ageing happens to person who stops learning" and it is also said that "if you eat three times a day you will grow fat, but if you read three times a day you will become wise". So never keep any barriers to learning for yourself because without focusing on learning, you are bound to get stagnant and to become stagnant in life is to begin to die. There is no safety in being the same person as yesterday. You need to improve daily, relentlessly.

Source : Learning from Robin Sharma and Darren Hardy