There are a lot of things that one day I think I will try to learn more about, but haven’t yet. In setting a learning focus for this year, one of the many items I jotted down was that I wanted to learn to cook. To learn in earnest to actually prepare food much better than I have been capable of doing on my own for the past several decades. Each of the other learning focus efforts are well underway, in those distinctions I continue learning. However, to this point in mid-March, I still haven’t yet readied myself with any purpose to learn through this particular change with cooking. Why?

Why did I write down that learning focus, yet continue to accept just what little I already know? In recollection, I first wrote this down after observing others in our family learning by doing and thoroughly enjoying their new experiences. The outcomes of these experiences were very well prepared foods that I enjoyed. I wanted to experience that for myself, or at least I thought I did in the moment.

Our decisions for what we learn and purposefully apply with what we continue learning are solely on us. I admired others as I watched them, but I have yet to commit to learn for myself. I haven’t wanted it badly enough to this point and have again grown comfortable by accepting what little I already know. We do this too much in what eventually might become a fairly short lifetime.

Today, I will create a disciplined change in my learning routine to learn to better prepare foods. I enjoy well-prepared foods so I will learn to make them. I’ll start with just one specific cooking principle or specific dish to get started, but my focus to truly change is made. I have now committed and told others that I have committed and now it will happen. You should commit to start one specific learning focus for yourself today as well.

“Action comes about if and only if we find a discrepancy between what we are experiencing and what we want to experience.” — Phillip J. Runkel —

MITM