It’s difficult for me to keep count of how many films I watched over the last Christmas period. So I’m sorry to tell you that I can’t tell you what film I was watching when a man told a young lady struggling to find her way in life that “We learn by doing”
To some extent, it doesn’t really mater what film it was anymore. The important thing is that it resonates with real life – most especially as we’ve come to a new year. The beginning of a new year which if we are to be honest, just like others we see as a special breakthrough year. We make new years resolutions, we make lists targets. We have all sorts of aims, process – you name it, in order to make this a better, more successful year. We wish each other all the very best; hoping and praying that dreams will come true.
Don’t get the wrong impression, in many ways I’m in the same boat. I do believe luck changes, breakthroughs come, dreams come true and God answers prayers. The only thing is I also believe that more often than not there is a requirement for us to do something extra, different or differently to get that result.
I don’t know about you, but I know that sometimes I’m held back by the fear of making mistakes and getting things wrong – what if I fail? Or for some there’s the concern that others may not see our genius and believe in us. But going back to the film that I mentioned, the truth is we learn by doing, I’m also becoming increasingly aware that if our intentions are right and we are not reckless, we’ll find that the right people will support us along the way. I therefore intend to just put myself out there more and learn as I go along.
Critically though, I intend to do so using three key sights as I go along i.e. Hindsight, Insight and Foresight.
You see, whilst I watched a fair number of films over the Christmas period, I also did quite a bit of reading on British Social and Economic history in preparation for a new book that I am working on. From doing so the criticality of the sights became apparent to me.
A common response to actions of leaders that didn’t quite workout the way they were planned was “with hindsight” he or should might have.. i.e. reviewed retrospectively – understanding the nature of an event after it has happened. Or a fuller dictionary definition that I believe makes it even clearer is: recognition of the realities, possibilities or requirements of a situation, event, decision etc after its occurrence.
The truth is we don’t have the benefit of hindsight for past decisions. However, whilst we should never dwell on it, we should reference past occurrences as part of our learning for the future. The saying that “history repeats itself” is frustratingly true when it refers to things that we’ve got wrong in the past.
Hindsight should become part of the basis of our insights and foresights to enable us to successfully move forward. In other words I believe that beyond the simple process of learning from our current actions we must learn from the past otherwise we do become reckless and have a negative impact not only on ourselves, but also others who are affected by our actions.
I believe our insights or intuitive understanding provides us with a grasp of the inner nature of things comes partly from our inner being, but also from our understanding of past experiences.
If we take the above and marry it with a bit of foresight i.e. planning and mental preparedness though there is still a bit of a risk we have a good basis for pressing forward and for greater success.
Wishing you all the very best for 2012
Susan
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