Progress report: I didn’t start the 10 day novel program. It is going to happen soon, because that is a format I want to explore. Most of what I learned about writing came from books like that I read growing up. I lived on books on writing. I gobbled up craft info in pursuit of getting better. What I found interesting is by the time I reached my masters program I was no longer gobbling up info. I went from wanting to know to convincing myself that I already knew. I fear that this is the effect of higher education. I’ve spent more time post edu trying to regain the ability to learn and reaching out to those sources of information that I began this journey with.
So that is the source of this reflection: What happens when we stop trying to be learners and become convinced of our own strength of knowledge. I had a curious incident with one of my kids the other night where we were talking about facts about the Novel Coronavirus and who was #1 in new cases. He thought he knew the answer and when we said it was something different he actually said, “let me get my phone” and came back with an answer that supported what he already believed. That answer was wrong. In truth our answer was wrong as well (CDC reported 61,000 new cases in Texas over the last 7 days). He wasn’t really interested in being wrong so much as he was interested in being right, which commonly takes root in the teenage years and never seems to let go for any of us.
That is what I have been trying to get better at: Being wrong and accepting that I don’t know and that I need to learn and that there is value in learning. As I learn I get better in my craft and I discover what works best for me.