Mindful Hack #105

I think curiosity is an undervalued quality.

Think about a young animal exploring its surroundings in its early days – the cautious ways it stretches beyond the reach of its mother in order to understand its environment, capabilities and limitations. Young human animals are also a pleasure to watch as they discover the marvels of the world (even if they might drive us insane with their incessant questions).

It would serve us well to have more of that “beginner’s mind” approach in our adult lives. As we learn, we tend to become less curious, believing we now know. And for many aspects of life that’s true – for example, there’s no need to remain curious about what happens when you stick a metal object into an electrical socket. I do wonder, though, how many missed opportunities there are to learn something new because we think we already know.

I would equate a curious mind with an open mind, and an open mind allows for creativity and making genius if seemingly impossible connections for innovation. Curiosity also allows us to change our minds – which aren’t always right to begin with (whatever “right” means). How much growth can happen without curiosity?

One way to foster curiosity is to practice mindfulness – that is to be open to the unfolding of whatever is going on around, without judging based on our past experiences. It’s not always useful to operate this way, but I’d argue it would be very valuable to do so some of the time. After all, there is always, undoubtedly, something new to learn.

Mindfully yours,

Adriane