The Independent Learner LyfeStyle (First Part)

"The true basis of education is the study of the human mind -- infant, adolescent and
adult."

Sri Aurobindo

Independent learners, also known as life-long learners or self-directed learners, know how to teach themselves whatever they want to know without enrolling in a class, ort at least know when and if a class is really necessary.

They can create a plan for their learning, seek out the resources and figure out how to master the material.

Every brain, that is every learner, is unique and no two are prepared to learn the same thing at the same time in the same way.

Most great philosophical traditions, including those embodied in Gandhi, Tagore, Aurobindo and Krishnamurti, recognize a spiritual component to learning, teaching that knowledge is more than a way to get a job or score well on a standardized test.

It is impossible to measure the success of self-learning with tests, grades, and scores.

These individuals are free to blossom in their own ways and do anecdotal evidence abounds about happy and successful learners who have travelled a non traditional path to their own personal success.

One way to strengthen and enlarge your skills is to look beyond scholarly sources.

The world of truth seeking, discovery, understanding, invention, and creation transcends the limited ways of knowing that most of us have been taught.

One of the advantages of being an independent learner is not being constrained, by training or peer pressure, to one single mode of inquiry.

Some inquiries are conducted best through solitary research and reflection; others thrive on interchange with peers.

Some draw principally from books and other written materials; others need gradual maturing over years, sometimes decades.

Self-learners often combine skills used by different kind of professionals, as the reference librarian, the university scholar, the investigative reporter and the detective, when they are searching information.

Respect And You Will Be Respected

"Respect yourself and others will respect you"

Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC)

It is important to respect other people opinion, especially when it is different from yours!

However, it is also important that you respect yourself; I mean you need to appear strongly convinced of what you affirm in front of others.

Self-learning does not mean that you should not interact with other people.

Self-learning involves only independent point of view but also it requires a great sense of respect and discipline.

It is also important to show your ethical values.

We reform and develop our values throughout our lives under the influence of friends, schools, and other institutional affiliations.

I would only to point out the centrality of ethical values about individual and professional effectiveness-specifically, honesty, trust, respect, and fairness.

Become Who You Ever Dreamed To Be

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.”

Buddha quotes (Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C.)

We put too often aside our dreams. We are busy too much every day.

Life gives nearby us and we do not realize there that when we were children we had a dream.

We exactly knew what we would have liked to do in our life, but we have forgotten him.

We are too much concentrated whether to gratify the others, deserve our place, be approved in the society, or simply to look for approval.

Even if we already have much money, we think only to have more of it. That child that was instead you was more essay of you!

To him it didn't interest the money, it didn't interest the power, it perhaps had some ambitions, but he or she knew the only way of realizing his or her own dreams it was to wish them and to realize them in concrete.

Listen to that child that was you. If you will know how to grant then his or her needs what you have always dreamed will become.

You cannot be wrong, sure!

The Art of Experimenting Things

"Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under the observation in life"

Marcus Aurelius

Why experimenting? Because this is by far the best way to learn something.

Experimenting has been and is still my most preferred activity.

I have experimented things in the following areas:

• Computer Programming Languages and Databases
• Telecommunications and Internet Protocols
• Business Management Techniques
• E-Learning Methods
• Self-Improvement theories
• Self-concept and self-esteem psychology
• Human Relationships Study
• Digital Electronics
• Financial Derivatives on Line Trading
• Web Marketing
• Eastern Philosophies

I find the best way to improve our education is combining formal education with live experience, but this works only for those matters we are interested about.

If you are not concerned about the topic you will have problems to keep new information, you need to be active in the learning process.

A Self-learner need to talk about his or her ideas to somebody else, a self-learner usually prefers to solve problems rather than follow instructions to be carried out.

A Self-learner need to gain experience from seeing what happens in his or her experiments.

When I was in primary school, I was forced (like anybody) to know poetry by heart, I hated to do that! I have never considered this as a creative task!

Also, I always disagree whit those who believe the more one is able to memorize the more he or she is intelligent!

We have invented computers just to do that! (I mean merely to store information).

We are not stupid! I think that the more you can solve problems knowing where to find information when needed, the more you best use your brainpower!

Unluckily this idea is uncommon in my country formal education.

This is a one of the reasons why I was forced to become autodidactic, that is a self-learner!

Do Not Follow The Crowd

"If you wait for opportunities to occur, you will be one of the crowds."

Edward de Bono

It is important to point out that our need to conform is strongly rooted in ourselves since our origin.

Luckily in the history of humankind there always had been some individuals like Albert Einstein, Galileo Galilei, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison and many others who did not think as the crowd.

Many of us believe that those special individuals were genius, not ordinary people, and that is true.

I would not to say that everyone should become necessarily a genius, but it is important, on my opinion, to study the biography of these great minds.

I mean that we can look at the way those extraordinary people thought and acted, then we can try to insert some new ideas into our own context.

I did that many times in my life and every time I learned something that subsequently, I put into practice with great results.

I have noticed that those genius and inventors had a special characteristic in common: not only they were standing out of the crowd, but also they were free from critiques of their contemporary.

This particular feature has always fascinated me.

I agree it is not so easy to act as a nonconformist but I am also convinced that if you believe in something you feel to be right and in the same time it does not hurt anyone else rights, you should do it!

Is Your Job The Right One?

"Learn to think in positive affirmations. Affirmations are any statements you make. Too often we think in negative affirmations. Negative affirmations only create more of what you say you don't want. Saying, I hate my job, will get you nowhere. Declaring, I now accept a wonderful new job, will open the channels in your consciousness to create that."

Louise Hay

If you are passionate about your job and if it makes you happy, what I am going to say probably does not concerns you.

I would not to bother anyone, but I have always thought about the following fact:

if you feel eager or even frustrated and if you have troubles interacting with your colleagues and with your entourage, probably your current job is not the right one.

Have you ever considered that someone else could do your inconvenient and hated job cheerfully?

I mean that someone else maybe most adaptive and who has fewer ambitions is losing his opportunity while you are occupying this role.

I would not say that you are going wrong, only that you could improve your job anytime if you want.

Many in the workforce are experiencing a nagging, growing sense of being too driven, with little or no time for family, important relationships or other personal values.

Maybe what you need is a greater sense of fulfillment and spiritual growth in what you are doing.

Maybe you are looking for community and meaning in your job.

Then you are examining different choices and opportunities keeping in mind your education, your potential and aims and your past job experiences.

I am firmly convinced that every one of us has the right in the long-term to approach him to the ideal and ever dreamed occupation.

If you do the right job, you are more happy and other people too! It works better both for you and for others.

It is finally a win-win situation.

Build Your Own Lifeline

"Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever."

Mahatma Gandhi

If you want to improve yourself you need to understand who are you and what are your deeper aims.

To do this you have first to summarize the big events of your life.

I know it; it is very difficult and uneasy to put the face in our past.

Nevertheless, if you are able to do this, you will benefit from this experience and to define your objectives will become easier.

When I achieved my Master Degree (MBA) in Switzerland, I was 32 and I was coming out from one of my bigger emotional losses.

Exactly at this turning point of my life, I was able to know myself deep inside and to answer my big questions.

I took a piece of paper and I wrote in these three columns: Age/Phase, Big Events and Feelings.

Then, line by line, I wrote in on instinct all my precedent experiences from age of 18 until 32.

This was the main event of my life! I was light up!

Finally, all became clear in my mind: who I was, what was most important for me at that moment, which were my top priorities, and so on...

It is most frequent to achieve this task during our crisis and most critical phases, rather than during our normal life trends.

A Lifeline can be helpful to value ourselves now and to be more confident and aware in current and future transitions.

We cannot change the past. However, we have choices about how we let it influence and inspire our future.