People are born with a natural talent for learning.

We learn by:

• understanding self (starts with our body parts and how they interact with surroundings), 
• observing other people (our parents having a huge initial impact), 
• observing our surroundings (identifying patterns, posing & testing hypotheses)
• perceiving (creating unique & personal explanations of the vast array of stimuli that 'hit' our senses), 
• memorizing knowledge (short-term & long-term memories of manifold experiences and perceptions), 
• imagining (holding images in our mind's eye...remembering past events and envisioning future events)
• practicing skills (so they get hard-wired into our brains), and , of course,
• interacting with people and things around us (from mirror neurons and Theory of Mind to mentors, trainers, and championship teams). 

Born to learn: that's the way we are born.

Our learning takes the form of a life-long series of self-corrected behaviours coupled with a life-long series of successful outcomes and not-so-successful hard knocks.

People are created with a remarkable capacity for learning.

All people are created that way. Then individual experiences affect the duration and extent of learning. Also, individual choices affect the extent and duration of learning. 

Here's an example of a string of thoughts about learning:

• I was born to learn.
• In the past, as I went about my learning, some people encouraged me and some people put me down. 
• Now, I see learning as my responsibility...I don`t seek encouragement and I am not put off by put downs.
• Now, I see introspection as the ongoing starting point for learning...as the ancient Greek aphorism states - Know Thyself.
• Now, I see individual strengths, wisdom, self-control, and positive attitude as the key ingredients for success in any endeavour...and each of these is the substance of life-long learning.
• I know, to succeed in a business role, I must combine my talents and specialized knowledge with life-long practice and exploration of new things. That is the only way to master business work.
• I know, because I have seen it first-hand, the capacity for learning does not have to wither with age...it is the one blessing that remains with us as long as we want it to and are prepared to do the brain work that self-feeds.

Here's a link to the first 14 CHANGING FOR THE BETTER Thought Posts.

And here are links to other articles about Change: Making Change, You Want to Make Some Changes at Your Business, Change is Only Constructive When People are Comfortable, What Does Change Mean To You?, and Change or Die.

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I write a lot about change. And, I read a lot about change. I do these things because when it comes to business change is pervasive, underestimated, ignored, and mishandled. And, those are just some of my mistakes.

Change is a topic worthy of life-long learning. Change affects every aspect of our lives. It is very personal, yet it defies being contained so it spreads from person to person and it affects one and all...in different ways.

A solid understanding of change, how it affects self, and how it affects others is an essential piece of leadership knowledge.

Without a good understanding of these aspects of change a leader is not and never will be much of a leader.

So, I study change. I select wisdom from various authors, scientists, leaders, and heroes and I do my best to understand that wisdom and use pieces of it to improve my understanding of change, how it affects me, how it affects the people I work with, and how it affects the people I serve.

Here is an excellent sample of such wisdom, an excerpt from John C. Maxwell's 'The 5 Levels of Leadership', (2011).

"Change in an organization is always a leadership issue. It takes a leader to create positive change. And the best way to start working as a change agent is the same as when trying to build a relationship. You need to find common ground. Any leader who wants to make changes is tempted to point out differences and try to convince others why change is needed. But that rarely works. Instead, focus on the similarities and build upon those. To get started, look for common ground. In the following areas:

• Vision: when the vision is similar, you can bet that the people are standing together and they have the same view. If their vision is similar to yours, you all see it clearly, and everyone has a strong desire to see it come to fruition, you can probably work well together.

• Values: It's difficult to travel with other very long if your values don’t align. Find out what others stand for and try to meet where you share the same standards.

• Relationships: Great teams have people who are as committed to one another as they are to the vision. If you've done the work on level 2, you should already share common ground in this area.

• Attitude: If you are going to get people to work together for positive change, their attitudes need to be positive and tenacious. If they're not, there will be trouble ahead.

• Communication: For change to occur, communication must be open, honest and ongoing. When people are in the dark they start to speculate about what’s happening. And their assumptions are often wrong. Inform people so that everyone is on the same page."

Thought Tweet #511 With the current fast-pace-of-change leaders need, more than ever, to be confident.

The Thinking Behind The Tweet

And confidence requires lots of energy...because energy is needed to fuel clear thought and action.