The best learning is in the field; “on the job”, “through the school of hard knocks”. Getting getting lots and lots of “Nos” is how you work out what is right. The more Nos, the more you learn. This is how nature learns. Go watch it. Watch a vine climbing a fence. It’s kind of funny actually: this is the opposite to how we are taught formally. We are taught to “do it THIS way”, and formally we spend lots and lots of time learning one thing, one skill. If there is one little variation in the reality of our subject, then that learning becomes the WRONG way – it simply will not work. And no skill has been built to see that it IS the wrong way. Even worse, it is wrong to even admit wrong! You have to learn this yourself, the “hard way”, informally. There is only built in you the expectation that it is the right way. What a recipe for disillusionment! Better to start with little knowledge and build a successful path through many, many “Nos”… This is the life.

Jeremiah Josey