Like several other people, I re-discovered Podcasts after listening to the Serial Series. This initiated my own series of searches of Podcasts about new and exciting business topics, self help, interesting stories, health and fitness Podcasts, etc. One Podcast that I seem to keep falling back on is TED radio. A particular TED talk worth mentioning on the Lorents Foundation site was Sir Ken Robinson’s, Do Schools Kill Creativity
Ken Robinson says, “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you won’t think of anything original.”
As I continue to gain experience and wisdom in the workplace and in my personal life, I notice that it is harder and harder for me to continue to come up with new exciting ideas, business ideas, hobbies I want to learn or subjects I want to study. After listening to this TED talk, I wonder if my lack of new ideas and motivation is because I am afraid to fail at something new? “We don’t grow into creativity, we grow out of it,” Sir Robinson says again.
This spring, I decided I needed to get certified in US Privacy. I am now a Certified Information Privacy Professional within the U.S. What an intense process this was for me to study a specific privacy topic from several privacy books and manuals and take a test on them. I had to choose between learning a topic or memorizing a book to pass an exam. I did both but haven’t done this since college, other than general courses or learning’s at work. I am glad I made this choice because it helped give me the confidence to push myself and learn new things.
As Ken Robinson says, “today we are running educational systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make. We are educating people out of their creativity.“ It is very important to never stop learning but also not to be afraid to make tough decisions or being afraid to make a mistake. Remember that it is ok to make mistakes as long as you learn from them.