Long Term Remembering
"and then you place the tire under the car..."- my dad instructing me on how to change a tire
When I was young my dad worked on his car often. He would have me sit by him and observe. Once in a while he would ask me to hand him a tool.
I learned how to repair quite a few things. But I never actually did those until later when I had a car of my own. So I was never sure that I had learned how until I tried it out when needed.
The other night while coming back home in the middle of the night I had to replace a tire by the side of the road. The tire had a nail in it and it leaked out. So at 11:30 at night by the side of the road, without a flashlight, I had to change the tire.
Just because changing a tire is simple does not mean you can do it quickly or easily at night by the side of the road in total darkness. Phones do not give out a lot of light to work by. Similarly, finding a grove under the car to place a jack under is hard when you can not see too well.
To say the least, there were many issues but in the end I managed to replace the tire. The challenges I ran into required me focus and not panic. In the end knowing the flow helped but I still made a couple of amateur mistakes: not placing rocks behind and in front of the tires, not placing the damaged tire under the car after removal.
It made me wonder how we re-construct old learnings when we need them. In this instance I had seen my dad changing a tire so I can go back and play the film in my mind. But other learnings might be only read from a book and harder to re-construct. They might require thinking for a while.
Today's question is:
"How do you reconstruct something you learned many years ago when needed?"
"and then you place the tire under the car..."- my dad instructing me on how to change a tire
When I was young my dad worked on his car often. He would have me sit by him and observe. Once in a while he would ask me to hand him a tool.
I learned how to repair quite a few things. But I never actually did those until later when I had a car of my own. So I was never sure that I had learned how until I tried it out when needed.
The other night while coming back home in the middle of the night I had to replace a tire by the side of the road. The tire had a nail in it and it leaked out. So at 11:30 at night by the side of the road, without a flashlight, I had to change the tire.
Just because changing a tire is simple does not mean you can do it quickly or easily at night by the side of the road in total darkness. Phones do not give out a lot of light to work by. Similarly, finding a grove under the car to place a jack under is hard when you can not see too well.
To say the least, there were many issues but in the end I managed to replace the tire. The challenges I ran into required me focus and not panic. In the end knowing the flow helped but I still made a couple of amateur mistakes: not placing rocks behind and in front of the tires, not placing the damaged tire under the car after removal.
It made me wonder how we re-construct old learnings when we need them. In this instance I had seen my dad changing a tire so I can go back and play the film in my mind. But other learnings might be only read from a book and harder to re-construct. They might require thinking for a while.
Today's question is:
"How do you reconstruct something you learned many years ago when needed?"
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