Ben – Reading response 4 & 5

Lateral thinking

This chapter mainly concerns suspending judgement until later. I find this to be especially applicable to the beginner’s mind: as a beginner, one has very little idea on what is appropriate for a situation, so when a beginner propose solutions it can vary from semi reasonable to outrageous (kinda like how adults see children and their big ideas). It can be useful to adopt this mindset as experts, since these ‘naive’ ideas tend to be on the right track but something in the details make them not feasible. The important thing is analyzing these details to eventually arrive at the right solution.

Art & fear

Art and talent being a pair feels like a tale as old as time. What I find most annoying is that people from my childhood used to jump at any opportunities to judge artwork. It’s not really a problem if someone can draw well, but for people who just want to dabble in it for fun (like me) it was hell: every time I tried to draw something new, I would get some scathing comments about how I should just stick to what is necessary (i.e., enough to pass art classes) rather than make new stuff. That plays a huge role in me not being interested in creative stuff from middle school all the way until university.

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