If you’ve ever been accused of “doing things the hard way,” then you’re in luck. You’re building your mind!
If you exercise, you realize the importance of continuing to increase the reps, length, or weights in order to maintain and improve fitness. For example, once you can easily do 50 push-ups, your body will be less challenged, and you’ll see little to no improvement. In order to improve, you have to increase the number. The same holds true for your mind. If you decide to tackle playing the piano, you’ll need to continue to put a new piece of music–that was harder than the last one–in front of you to improve your skills.
I think that this is particularly important given today’s improvement in technology and the effect it’s having on our cognitive abilities. You no longer have to remember phone numbers because they are all listed in your cell, you no longer have to remember directions, because your GPS plans your route, and you no longer have to remember how to spell, because your word processor does it automatically. While you could argue that those improvements allow you to use your brain for other more important information, if you don’t actually strive to fill those gaps with more complex information and learning, then your mind will atrophy.
So, next time someone tells you that you’re doing something the hard way, tell them that you’re doing it on purpose.
I agree that exercise and repetition (and recovery) can improve your body and mind.
But we can also push further as a way of working our system. In that case not only may we work the system but we may get better outcomes than by doing things the hardway.
Example: I want to make a device that has little lights on it that you can wear.
Option A (The Hard Way): I can try and create my own circuitry and learn all about making a PCB and create the device nearly from scratch.
Option B (The Enlightened Way): I could adopt a simple existing miniature computer such as Arduino. Then the project gets up and running quickly and we get people trying the device sooner (more focus on the usability and how users will use the device). We eventually may do Option A to cut costs for manufacturing but by using a more rapid prototype mechanism, the product gets to testing faster and we succeed.