We've continued reading The Rise by Sarah Lewis. Over the last 4 weeks, we covered the sections:
• Beauty, Error, and JusticeOf those sections, what's one idea or quotation that you've really lingered on? Why or how so? Please provide a page citation when possible.
• The Blind Spot
• The Iconoclast
• The Deliberate Amateur
31 comments:
I think the most noteworthy of these concepts to me were found within this last chapter, The Deliberate Amateur. Although I pinpointed one thing from my post last week, I think the overall ideology is important. I value the thought of learning humility and being able to "reset" your mindset in order to understand things in a new light. I also believe that without doing so, without becoming the student first, you can not become an effective educator.
The quote, "Failure became not the outcome, but the refused attempt (111)," stuck with me from the chapter "The Blind Spot." You only fail when you don't keep trying to complete the task.The more attempts a person takes to do something, the better they become and the likelihood of them succeeding is higher. I believe everyone can take something from this quote.
The idea that has stuck with me is from The Blind Spot chapter about failure. I usually saw failure as something negative. I saw it as a result of not working hard enough or not being smart enough. After this chapter I see it more as a stepping stone to greater knowledge. When you fail at something, you eliminate that thought process and are challenged to find a new and innovative solution to the problem. "Failure is not a punishment and success is not a reward...You choose how to respond."
"First make people laugh, then make people think" (143) was one of the quotes that struck my attention. I found this quote particularly interesting because I am one to believe that if you gain a sense of ease, or acceptance from your targeted audience then they will be more susceptible to listen to you and take your words into consideration. If you don't have credibility, you need that foundation with people in order to get them to take you seriously. By connecting with them on that level, you chances are greater when you need to get them to think.
The idea I found interesting is on page 91, in the chapter titled "Beauty, Error and Justice". Douglass says "The 'key to the great mystery of life and progress' was the ability if men and women to fashion a mental or material picture and let his or her entire world, sentiments, and vision of every other living thing be affected by it". To me this is saying that you have to be willing to allow other ideas and opinions besides your own to help shape the way you think. It is possible to be wrong sometimes, but it would be beneficial to allow others to help you progress in life.
The idea that stuck with me was about failure in the Blind Spot. I always thought of failure as a negative thing that I never wanted to achieve and the book made me think about the other aspects of failure and how you can't succeed in life without ever failing. I never saw that failing teaches other things about life than success came. Failure shows are strong and courageous you can be to get back up and keep trying. Failure also helps you to accept and understand criticism and then you learn from your mistakes and you change the way you presented your work or what you did. I always thought that failure was just a negative thing that I didn't need to be, but there is more than meets the eye when it comes to failure.
In The Blind Spot, the definition Sara Blakely's father gave her of failure has stuck with me. "Failure became not the outcome, but the refused attempt" (111). It reminded me of that quote "You miss 100% of the shots you do not take." But anyway, her father redefining failure in this way brings more positivity to the word. No matter the outcome, you at least have to try and it will be a success in that regard. It would probably be nice and motivating if everyone could work that definition of failure into their minds.
In the deliberate amateur chapter, on page 162 Lewis asks, "How many scientific revolutions have been missed because their potential inaugurators disregarded the whimsical, the incidental, the inconvenient inside the laboratory?". I've lingered on this quote because the amount of things that haven't been discovered because researchers just miss one small thing is astonishing. There is so much that has been found, but there is still so much more that is yet to be known.
The chapter that really resonated with me was The Blind Spot. Like many people, I used to think of failure as a bad thing. It was the outcome of not trying your hardest or not performing to your best, but now I see as a stepping stone to a greater outcome. I think the quote that really stuck with me was when Blakely's father said, "Failure became not the outcome, but the refused attempt" (111). I really think that it shows that you have to take chances no matter how you may fear of the negative effects.
The one thing that has stuck with me the most was in the Blind Spot on page 107-109 where they talk about the trail that was supposed to be tore down but a photographer found it and realized the beauty in it. From the picture you can tell it must be a beautiful sight to see with all the wildlife that has grown there. People are quick to dismiss/tear down things when they do not have any use. If they look closer though they can see how great they actually are.
In "Beauty, Error, and Justice" the quote that says, "What is the future of how we think about so-called failure, these dubious starts and unlikely transformations... we can answer it by finding ways to honor them, by not letting the path out of them stay hidden..." (p 105). I particularly liked this part in the book because it demonstrates the importance of learning from our mistakes. Making mistakes often moves us more forward than holding us back, but we can allow them to hold us back if we let them. I like that this quote encourages us to fail in order to succeed because so many people, including I sometimes, are too afraid of making mistakes. But, staying in our comfort zone doesn't make us better; we need to be more comfortable with being uncomfortable to grow as individuals.
The quote that has lingered with me the most is on page 151. "Experience.. is what gets you through the door, But experience also closes the door," she said. " You tend to rely on that memory stick with what has worked before. You don't try anything anew." I feel as people we do this every day in our lives with many different things. I myself like to try new things because you never know, the outcome of trying those new things may turn out to be for the best. Some people do this with their jobs. They like to stick with what they know, but this can also only make them limited to certain things. The sky is the limit to me. Being a nursing student, people as me "what field of nursing would you like to be in?" I tell them all the time, I want to try everything.
The idea or quotation that has really lingered on with me is in Beauty, Erros And Justice on page 105. The text says, "Seeing the uncommon foundations of a rise is not merely a contrarian way of looking at the world. It has, in many cases, been the only way that we have created the one in which we are honored to live in." This quote lingers on with me for two reasons. Everyone is going to be somewhat a contrarian at some point in time of their life whether it be for a moment, several moments or a lifetime and it leads me to want to question how many of us are really honored to live in the world we live in?
Out of the last few chapters, I enjoyed Beauty, Error, and Justice the most. The concept of aesthetic force stuck with me; from its detailed explanation I felt like I could really connect with its meaning. The quote that made me feel this way was on page 94 and it reads,"Our reaction to aesthetic force, more easily than logic, is often how we accept with grace that the ground has shifted beneath our feet" (Lewis). I feel like I know that particular feeling all too well, unlike the quote says, I tend not to adjust and accept abrupt change with grace, but this chapter helped me to really see why it is crucial to do so. The world is steadily changing around us and in order to succeed we can't see that as a disadvantage, we must adapt. This chapter was personally encouraging for me.
Out of the chapters listed above, the "Blind Spot" stood out to me the most. In the chapter, Lewis discusses failure and how we can learn from it by rethinking our failed attempts. I thought that this was a good way to look at what we perceive as failures. Failing is not a bad thing, it just an opportunity to learn from. One of the quotes from that chapter that stood out to me was on pg. 111 when Lewis writes about the entrepreneur's father would ask "what did you fail at today?". I thought that this would be an interesting way to end the day by reflecting and learning from one's mistakes. Then you could use these "failures" as motivation for the next day.
The quote that I lingered on most was when the author writes about Laura Pooley saying, "she attributes the conversion, in large part, to her father's childhood reconditioning about failure and its definition. Failure became not the outcome, but the refused attempt" (pg.111). This quote stuck with me because I like the idea of becoming reconditioned to see failures in a more positive way. However, I was unsure how this was actually possible. I feel that someone can look back on failure positively once they have succeeded, but at the time of failure it will always be difficult to accept. Therefore, one can reshape their thoughts of failure after the fact, but not be reconditioned to be completely fine with it as it is occurring.
In the Deliberate Amataeur, I think of the concept of "the amateur's useful wonder" on page 151. I think about this concept because I think of my successes and future successes that I am trying to accomplish. When staying aware of the "Einstellung effect," I am able to avoid the possibility of "costing my success." I think of becoming an open-minded person that is humble, even as an expert.
-B. Nigeda
The section in "The Deliberate Amateur" that talks about being in between an expert and an apprentice was very insightful for me. It states on page 151, '"Driven by impulse and desire, the amateur stays in the place of a "constant now", seeing possibilities to which the expert is bling and which the apprentice may not yet discern."' I think this is a good place to be, a state of learning and constant awareness. I like being in that in-between stage of things, I appreciate the process-- sometimes more than the outcome.
The idea that stood out to me was from The Blind Spot chapter. The quote, " there is a difference between being beaten and being strengthened, for as it happens, it is hard to perceive" (pg 111) is one that I relate to a lot. This quote stands out to me because even in school you start to feel defeated and burned out after years of assignments and being graded, but I have to remember that the end result will be a degree and a life long career. Even though one feels beaten you are learning and gaining knowledge that will help in the long run.
The quote that stuck with me can be found in the chapter The Blind Spot on page 111,"Failure became not the outcome, but the refused attempt." I like this quote because we often think of failure as someone not accomplishing their goals. However, this quote offers a new perspective. It is also uplifting advice. People often think that they are failures when they've had trouble completing multiple goals. When in reality, they are successful just because they gave it a shot.
I was really keen to The Deliberate Amateur chapter. On page 151 they talk about thinking outside of the box. They mention that experience may get you through a door to a lot of places but it will also close the door. This is because when we experience something that goes right then we will continue to do it the same way but why not think of other ways it might work as well. It might even work better. We just have to be careful as to not close off our thinking but expand it instead.
A lot of this book was uninteresting to me. Not because it was boring, but more-so that the point of view was not one that I completely agreed with. However, the quote "Our reaction to aesthetic force, more easily than logic, is often how we accept with grace that the ground has shifted beneath our feet" (Lewis 94) really stuck with me. The idea that we often choose to believe what is most easily seen from the outside, rather than truly investigating all aspects of a situation, could not be more true. I have often thought of this as a detriment to man-kind. The lack of logic and the quick-to-judge nature of humanity is something that needs to be addressed. One way is through education, which is arguably the most effective way to enlighten, relieve ignorance, and change preconceived notions that are solely based on first-glance assumptions.
I think "The Deliberate Amateur" chapter really stuck with me. In that chapter Lewis talks about mastering new things and not being complacent. The knowledge we have now may get us through life and provide us with great opportunities but without growth we get nowhere. You can't expect to graduate from college only knowing what you knew when you first came here. Learning is a lifetime thing, you never stop learning. As the world changes too you must also be willing to learn new things to accommodate with the world's changes.
I think that the Deliberate Amateur is the chapter that stood out the most to me. I believe it tied things together and it really has a way of pushing the reader. This is a very motivating book in a way and this chapter urges the reader to refuse complacency of knowledge. The quote "Any process that 'promotes the freedom of mind' is productive," really exemplifies this.
A quote that stuck with me come from page 95 where it says, "Memory is set up to use the past to imagine the future: and "its flexibility creates a vulnerability- a risk of confusing imagination with reality." This quote stuck with me because it make you actually think about it and it made me realize just how true that quote is because everything that we imagine for ourselves in the future comes from things in our memories whether they are good or bad. Also because it can often happen that we do confuse our imagination with reality when we think too much of how we want something to be our how we wish that things were.
~Tashawna Nash
The idea of failure is not an uncommon feeling. This novel does a good job of motivating the reader to overcome failure and never being to afraid to even try. We are all going to fail, but it's what we do with those failures that make us who we are.
What stuck with me was aesthetic force or that its like freely accepting change. This stuck with me because The Iconoclast was not interesting and because the idea of aesthetic force makes sense. The audience can relate to those concepts more than the "Black list." Everybody's lives are full of things we can't change. Like aesthetic force, we naturally accept the changes.
The idea that has lingered with me, comes from the reading last week when she discusses amateurs. She points out, particularly on page 147, that being an amateur can allow someone to be more driven, and more open to opportunity. As a student, I could relate to this because I am currently an amateur in my field. The word amateur, can sometimes have a negative connotation. But here, she paints in it a positive light. She reminds readers that in your lack of expertise, your mind is more open and imaginative- and this feature of imagination and drive can often be lost when your'e an expert. I overall felt this chapter allowed me to see the positive in the stressful adventure of going from a student to a professional.
One quote that I lingered on was from the chapter "Beauty, Error, and Justice" on page 93. Douglass sais "Erasing the dichotomy of liberty and slavery would out even greater presssure on what "success and failure"- increasingly unmoored from financial position, but determined by character, agency, & vision would come to mean in public life." I liked this quote so much because we often time associate the amount of money a person has to the amount of success they have achieved no matter their personal characteristics, which I think is faulty. If someone has made a wealthy living robbing and killing people can we really say this person is succesful just because of the amount of wealth they have attained?
I think the concept about failure in the blind spot stuck out to me because it highlights something we have all experienced. It emphasizes the saying that talks about failing to make a lightbulb 10 times, what you learn is 10 ways how to not make a lightbulb. Although we may fall short of our goals, we still learn things that would not have been known if we had not failed at all.
"A rise often falls into the blind spot of vision, and so we tell the stories that I have in this book because we are hardwired not to be able to glimpse them. Like type II error in statistics, a "false negative," when we have evidence but can't see that an alternative hypothesis is correct, these rises are a perceptual miss" (Lewis, p.110).
This stayed in my mind after reading the book, or specifically this section. The reason why I say this is because, it is true and at times I am guilty of having a blind spot especially when it comes to dealing with situations where the evidence is in front of me but I still am unable to see the alternative. I also, enjoyed the fact that the writer included the boxing analogy. Where she describes the fact that in the ring while a boxer is losing the spectators are yelling, but they don't view that the beating is strengthening him. I found that to be inspiring.
Post a Comment