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Learning
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Are You a High Definition Thinker? Check Your A.ccuracy of Awareness By: Charlotte Palmer
Well, Sisters Taking Care of Business, we just keep getting S.M.A.R.T.er and smarter, as we become more sensitive to our senses, muse and amaze, and align our thinking to the High Definition world in which we live. A.ccuracy of Awareness challenges us every day as we retrieve memory, analyze and synthesize ideas, summarize, and hypothesize. All those "ize" scrutinizing us can make us feel very uncomfortable at times. Some successful processes for de-stressing our lives come about through these strategies:
Ask questions and pose problems. We women are so much readier than men to ask driving directions. Do we have the same willingness to read operating instructions on the many gadgets and software applications that intrude upon our daily experience? Do we call the Help Desk? Do we talk to the Customer or Support Service Representative? They're trained to have the answers we don't have, but we do have to ask them. Wikipedia and Google can usually link us to our needed answers equally well.
Posing problems takes us into planning scenarios for the "what ifs" that undermine our sense of security. While the focus is usually on dealing with a "worst case scenario", why not give yourself a boost by asking "what would a 'best case scenario' look like?" When you are asking for something, and you get it; there are likely to be more ramifications to it than you had anticipated. If a check for $1,000,000 arrived in the mail for you tomorrow, and there will be another one for you every month for the next five years; what are you going to do with all that money? Actually thinking beyond your needs to an opportunity for philanthropy is an excellent way to experience the value system you have developed. Does it serve you well? Does it need clarifying, reorganizing, or expanding? If all we focus on is lack and a need to meet the bottom line, how can we raise our lives to a higher level of choice-making and influence?
I learned a long time ago that the act of formulating a question is the stimulus for producing a recognizable answer. Ask questions. Pose problems. Get answers.
Check for accuracy and precision. How do you feel at the grocery checkout counter
Precision comes with practice, and self-initiated practice gets you to the point where your good is better and your better is best. When practice is a personal choice, you have voluntarily committed your entire attention to the task performance, and improvement will become apparent.
Be specific in thought and language. We love quality performances by musicians, artists, and actors. Through their music, paintings, and portrayals they bring a larger world of nuance, revelation, and intimacy to our shared experience. Poets, writers, journalists, and newscasters want us to identify with their topics so that we feel connected. Think of the collage artist or photographer who takes a multitude of separate sketches or photos and fashions them into one compelling larger image. As our eyes go back and forth between the macro image and the micro component pictures, we get many new connections between the greater whole and the sum of its parts.
Every time you see more details in a perceived situation and clarify or amplify the effectiveness of your writing with more expressive word choices, you help yourself and others acknowledge more facets of the topic. Your writing attracts attention like a sparkling diamond. Your conversation has more points of connection for your listeners. Imagery triumphs over "You know?" The thesaurus is your friend. Build your word power. A fun and philanthropic way to add to your vocabulary is the Free Rice project at http://www.freerice.com/. Log on and take leveled vocabulary quizzes. The more words you know, the more rice will be sent to people in underdeveloped countries. What a concept!
A.ccuracy of Awareness processes are the ways to be totally focused in the present on whatever situation confronts you. When you give 100% attention to a task, you have the satisfaction and confidence of knowing it is your best effort. As you continue to receive information from others and personal insights on the topic, be open to updating your thoughts on the topic, too. We live in a dynamic, evolving world that seems to be speeding up with all our global communication channels. Ride the waves of change with the inner knowledge that as you continue to be totally present in each "now" moment, you are the best "you" you can possibly be. A friend of mine proclaims this position proudly as "Living a life of no regrets". May we all share her commitment to "mean what I say, and say what I mean".
Charlotte Palmer, a 43-year veteran teacher, holds Masters degrees in Learning Disabilities (USF) and Multicultural Multilingual Studies (UF). Since 2005 she has added certification in Brain Gym® Edu-Kinesiology. In addition to tutoring and teaching at the primary and college levels in the Tampa Bay area, Charlotte presents programs on integrated brain-based learning and successful thinking skills.
Check out the previous articles from Charlotte in this series! Click Below on the PDF to Review:
Check_Out_Your_S.M.A.R.T._Thinking_Strengths.pdf
Rate_Your_SMART_Thinking_test.pdf
Switched-On_Lifelong_Learner.pdf
Wake_Up_and_Realize_New_Insights.pdf
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when the cashier doesn't come up with an accurate total? Are you miffed if it is more than you reckoned? Do you return change if she gives you too much? Do you just say, "It's her loss" and pocket the extra? We want others to be accurate and precise with us so we know exactly what to expect with no surprises. Can we match others' levels of accuracy in our recording, reporting and accounting? Inventories, audits, and peer reviews are some of the processes put into place to keep us all accountable. If we are totally present in our daily experiences, we will achieve our highest degree of accuracy of awareness. If we take time to reflect on what we have done after we have done it, we have just rechecked our accurate awareness. Multi-tasking can inhibit focused thinking.
Be aware of your own thinking process. Metacognition, thinking about your thinking process, is the name of the game. In math classes teachers urge students to "tell me how you solved that problem?" As students progress through the steps of what they did to get an answer, they see how their thinking deductively moves from known math processes to observable, valid, logical results. Calculation can never be the sole responsibility of calculators. Likewise, the scientific process from the hypothesis based on what is known research to what will happen if you change one selected component of the process belongs to all who will claim it. Observe and record data from multiple trials. Analyze and summarize your data then draw a conclusion. When we are making choices about buying a car or home, choosing an alternate or additional career component, or deciding on a retirement plan; it is helpful to look at our own reasoning processes. If you don't feel up to comparing and contrasting the available options, hire the services of a professional without a vested interest in the outcome to walk you through the process. Feeling confident with how you reached a life-changing decision will make the shift to the new experience much more satisfying.Copyright © WTCB- Women Taking Care of Business, Inc. ® All Rights Reserved See Terms of Use for this website |