Some people have a resistance to learning. Research so far has been unable to determine why that is. Some learn slowly, but retain their knowledge well. Some learn quickly, but also forget what they have learned easily. Some can learn fine for a time, until they decide they have learned enough on the topic and then a functional resistance to learning anything more kicks in, such as a student studying only until the point they feel they can pass their exam. Some can learn extensively about a topic and even lecture on it, but they cannot actually do the skill themselves, such as a Professor who teaches a course on being an entrepreneur, but has never had a successful business of their own.
The first stage of learning is acquiring knowledge, and then skills are developed through repetition. There is a cognitive component to learning and a physical or action component to learning. The next stage is competency, when the action can be performed with a reasonable level of skill. There are also people who have talent, and talent is something different. It is something we are born with, our talents are not simply from having been taught. If you have someone who works for your business that has talent, you will know it. Intelligence is also something different, it is the ability to take the knowledge and skills we have learned, apply them towards a problem, and solve the problem.
Habits are behavioral patterns and if they are strong enough, the cognitive habits in our neurons will take over and actually control our behavior. A coaching program tests for, works with, and develops these habits we all have. How do our habits apply to learning? It is more fulfilling to learn about topics that match our habits. It is easier to learn if we build up our existing neural pathways, or habits, to guide our learning process rather than trying to create new ones. And, strengthening existing pathways is just as effective as trying to create new ones.
Learning among people in the world is accelerating, skyrocketing, like never before. As individuals, we have to commit to lifelong learning, and if we have a resistance to learning it’s important to work on that, and push ourselves out of our comfort zone to continue our development. People who have never pushed themselves to learn and grow will likely find themselves unemployable at some point as the world’s knowledge and skills continue to grow. This can also happen to someone with a habit of trying to do the bare minimum to get by: minimal effort and minimal learning; trying to do as little as possible for as long as possible.
Collectively, if the employees in a business don’t continue to develop their skills, a business will stagnate and start to fall behind. This also applies on a national scale, to a country. If they don’t invest in education and their learning institutions and the collective knowledge of their people, the results lead to poverty, failure, and death over time.
I believe that the reason coaching has such a transformative power for change is because you will be asked to work hard, it is not a promise of a quick fix or a magic cure. This is not a service that only a younger person could benefit from. The key to healthy aging is cognitive, is getting out of our comfort zones and to never retire from forcing our brain to perform outside our comfort zone. If we stop challenging ourselves and learning at any age, our brain shrinks, our neuronal connections start to become passive, and we can become forgetful. Research shows that a lifetime of learning, creating, and innovating gives us our best chance for a long and healthy life.
Learning and developing skills is an important component of our mental health and self care. Many times, I have met with parents who have invested a lot of time and money into psychotherapy for their “failure to launch” or “boomerang” adult children who are living off of them and not working, with poor results, because a coaching program would have served that person better. I enjoy being trained in both so I am better able to recommend either psychotherapy or coaching (or both) for an individual based on their needs.