The Power of Learning

I was an average student in high school. Although my parents always wanted me to study, I rarely did; I could never get excited about learning. I took a year off after high school and then went to college. It wasn't until I took one particular course that I realized how important learning would become to my future. This time I studied, and this time I made the dean's list.

The course was called Learning Techniques and it was taught by a wonderful man named Adolph Capriolo. He taught us how to read more effectively and the best ways to take a test. He taught us how to think and how to understand situations more clearly. What he taught me and what really got me excited about learning was that I had something to offer— I had the ability to learn, to achieve, and to learn some more. This is what this book is about—that learning is a continuous adventure. And it is an adventure that starts in childhood.

I have interviewed many famous doctors, and they have all agreed on one point—that it is important to establish learning patterns early, when the brain is most receptive. The brain is maximally plastic up until the age of eight. Up until then, it is possible, for instance, for one portion of the brain to take over for another injured part. After the age of eight, this becomes increasingly difficult.

There are two important things you can do to instill the love of learning in children:

• Communicate with them. Read to them all the time. Take them places out of the ordinary, such as petting zoos, hands-on museums, and parks. Spend time with your children, and answer their questions (even if they seem silly).

• Give them love and recognition. Praise them for learning new things and for jobs well done. Let them know that you are excited when they learn new things.

A TIME Magazine article from 1997 titled "Fertile Minds" claims that studies have shown that babies even as young as two-and-a-half months can learn and remember visual sequences and simple mechanical tasks. Five-month-olds can grasp the basic concepts of addition and subtraction. Six-month-olds can recognize language, long before they know how to speak. Infants even seem to have an innate understanding of the laws of physics, of how the world is supposed to work (for example, that objects can't hang in midair by themselves or pass through solid barriers). If this is how much we're capable of before we're even 1 year old, imagine what the adult mind can do!

You have one life; you have one chance to learn as much as you can and reach your highest potential. The only way you can discover that potential is to experiment and experience, to use your mind and body fully, and to engage yourself totally in life. You are a perfect instrument for testing what you see, hear, feel, smell, and touch. The more you engage your senses, the more you can experience and understand the world around you. Ask yourself, "Have I explored this subject with every level of understanding I have? Have I gone as deep as I can go? Have I been thinking creatively? Have I remained focused? Do I understand the truth of this experience?"

Always remember that the best way to learn is through action—to fail, to fall, to rise up, and try again. Nothing replaces the understanding you get through experience, through totally immersing yourself in an activity so that all your senses are involved. As author John Holt said:

"Not long ago I began to play the cello. Most people would say that what I am doing is 'learning to play' the cello. But these words carry into our minds the strange idea that there exist two very different processes: one, learning to play the cello; and two, playing the cello. They imply that I will do the first until I have completed it, at which point I will stop the first process and begin the second. In short, I will go on 'learning to play' until I have 'learned to play' and then I will begin to play. Of course, this is nonsense. There are not two processes, but one. We learn to do something by doing it. There is no other way."

Or, as science fiction author Ray Bradbury put it, "First you jump off the cliff, and you build your wings on the way down."