Lifelong learning resolution

Lifelong learning resolution is not a single event, but a contract with ourselves we should reestablish every year. This contract creates a positive productivity cycle with exponential returns. Make a commitment to learning every year and enjoy increasing rewards. More reading here, and here.

Learning as a feedback

We do not usually treat learning as feedback process. We plan to acquire some knowledge, and once we acquire it we move on to do other things. This is not the most effective approach.

Compare learning with investment. We can invest in some cool stock or ETF, establish trading accounts, buy and sell, realize a 20% gain, and retire. This is not how professional investors work. Good investors typically establish a balanced portfolio or invest in an ETF of a balanced portfolio, and then reinvest the gains year after year. The reinvestment part is crucial. Over several decades, even small gain will grow exponentially. When considering a lifetime, a multiplier x10 on the original investment is normal and x50 on the original investment is good.

Does a similar logic apply to learning?

MARGE platform

Read here, here, here, here, here, and here. MARGE is just one of many ways to represent the feedback loops in our brains. There are multiple feedback mechanisms in our brain, collectively linked to dopamine:

1. Motivation. As we learn correctly, we get a gamified reward and become more motivated. The gamification can change. Some people write code, others treat patients. There has to be an objective measure for newly acquired skills.
2. Attention. Motivation generates dopamine. This dopamine enables attention. For someone with ADHD this translates to hyperattention. Something suddenly becomes very important and we can stay razor-sharp on it provided intrinsic motivation.
3. Relate. The attention mechanisms often activate the entire brain. We relate on several levels. There is an understanding of the challenge we address and how it can improve our life, we relate to the teacher or a coach on a personal level, we get an intuitive understanding of what we learn.
4. Generate. As we gain an understanding of the subject, we stop being passive. We can use the new knowledge actively in our projects, or simply in conversation. We can build theories and ask follow-up questions.
5. Evaluate. Testing is critical for the creation of dopamine. Every new achievement needs to be tested, and success in the test will generate dopamine to drive up motivation. The success should not be perfect. It is better to have follow-up questions and motivation to improve further.

In my other courses, I use Bloom’s taxonomy. The MARGE framework here is simpler to understand and follow, but the outline is very similar.

Is the gain exponential?

Lifelong commitment to learning may generate an exponential increase in knowledge. This does not mean that all kinds of knowledge are equal. With the introduction of the internet, humanity roughly doubles the amount of information stored on servers every two years or so. Does that mean that we get x2 more useful knowledge? Not necessarily. Mainly we get influencers talking garbage vs videos of cats a decade ago.

Even though I can read x100 faster than I did 20 years ago, this does not generate a significantly faster learning rate. I read and write everything I need at top speed to get stuck with hands-on practice on face-to-face instructions. Lifelong learning is tricky. Every time we get an advantage, we learn how limited our understanding really is. If anything grows exponentially, it is the number of questions that do not get properly answered. Each partially answered question spawns a whole follow-up conversation.

Life is NOT a work of art

It would be nice to express our entire will as a flawless dance of life. Unfortunately, this can be done only in fiction. Life is typically petty and messy. Our bodies are imperfect, even though some learn to hide the imperfections better than others. Having something that is workable is typically good enough. Trying to get beyond workable into perfection generates significant health risks. Going further into expressive and unrealistic may produce hideous results. Consider actresses and plastic surgery. Eventually, something unpleasant is likely to happen reducing the face to a mask. Does this metaphor extend to learning?

Experts who know all about something very specific tend to be dogmatic and boring. Furthermore, they often fail to adapt to paradigm changes. Managers and philosophers who know little something about everything tend to have great stories that do not pass experimental tests. Lifelong learning is about combining different levels of expertise into a workable portfolio. Is it perfect? No. Is it expressive, beautiful, or artistic? This is very subjective. For me, all my knowledge feels like trying to keep water in a sift. No matter what I do, I miss something important. If anything, comedy is the true mirror of human existence.

Having workable knowledge about many things is a blessing.

1. There are fewer obstacles we cannot overcome. Creativity skyrockets and there are “known solutions” we can use.
2. It is easy to adapt to changes and learn new things via analogy and knowledge transfer.
3. The world we experience is richer. Everything is connected to some memory, art piece, or event. Things become more meaningful this way.
4. A workable portfolio of knowledge is surely respected. Unkile dogmatic experts or clueless demagogues, people who can build, fix, and organize things are useful and valuable everywhere.
5. Personal knowledge can be monetized. Typically to monetize one’s knowledge it needs to be dulled down. Kaynes was one of the best economists ever, but his initial investments reportedly failed. Eventually, he became a successful investor, only after dulling out his insight.

Stay relevant

Staying relevant is tricky. Multiple challenges require lifelong learning:

1. Technology changes. This means that except for very few truly traditional industries all hands-on skills become obsolete within two decades.
2. Paradigms change. Technological transitions are relatively smooth. Ideological changes are bumpy. Something irrelevant and marginal can become mainstream overnight with one discovery, making the previous mainstream outdated.
3. Trends and fashions change. Cultural changes are very hard to predict and even harder to follow. There are artists and musicians with short-lived success and those who are timeless. People who can be timeless learn how to see and leverage the changes early or select niches that do change much.
4. We get older. As we age we get to shine differently. Young people have good reaction time and visual perception. Middle-aged people are more experienced and have better leadership skills and decision-making.  Elders have better patience, storytelling, and mentoring skills.
5. Man-moment-machine intersection. Occasionally all the changes generate great threats or great opportunities. Such situations are rare and transient. People who can leverage these “combos” may have great and unexpected achievements.

Before the age of 30 we learn to get access to some people and industries. Between the ages of 30 and 40 we want to maximize our achievements. Above the age of 40, simply being relevant in an ever-changing environment becomes a huge challenge.

Competition with automation and outsourcing

The world we live in is increasingly competitive. A hundred years ago, the main source of competition were other local businesses. The competition could get ugly, but at least it was comprehensive. Today the challenges are on several planes of existence:

1. Local competition. Very similar to what it used to be 100 years ago. We tend to live in areas with certain specializations. Somewhere in Scotland, there is an area of businesses that brew quality whiskey, while Silicon Valley produces cutting-edge software. There is a competition between the experts in a given discipline within the local physical area. The competition here is brute force: do something faster or better, provide unique connections or services, and leverage unique advantages.
2. Outsourcing. Quite often there are significantly cheaper experts in some other countries like China and Poland roughly doing almost the same thing cheaper. Alternatively, there may be some boutique experts in another country like Italy who cost more and do something of amazing quality. The competition is global both for cheap prices and for quality products. One of the best solutions to positioning is joining a great team with a unique culture.
3. Automation. Possibly whatever we do can be done by AI or robots, often cheaper or better. It is hard to explain why robots fail to do some large -scale activity effectively or cost-effectively.  The explanation is easier for one-off products and smaller niches. In this case, the focus is on personal creativity and adaptivity.
4. Next generation. Experience is an asset in some areas. It can also be a limitation in some other areas. Typically we enjoy more young athletes, actors, and artists, while teachers and mentors get more respect as they age.  Changing the job definition may be the best tactic to handle this.

Lifelong learning commitment is the best solution

Honestly, lifelong learning commitment is the best solution to all of the challenges above. As we learn, we become more creative, can join great teams and communities, and maybe even carve our own competitive advantage and cultural niche. When we learn, the focus should be on a workable portfolio of knowledge, rather than just some expertise or wide understanding,