A curriculum doesn’t drive learning; curiosity drives learning.

When we consider the learning pattern of those who are outside of schooling systems, it’s curiosity that drives their learning, not the prescribed milestones of an education system. From Google to TED, from books to stories passed down from our elders, learning is more about readiness than reached milestones.

When our learning is stifled, forced or limited by a curriculum, we can become frustrated and suppress our yearning to learn something new. This is an unhealthy state in which to slip.

When we learn something new, we exercise our brain, improving cognitive functions such as concentration, attention to detail, memory recall, and problem-solving. 

We become interested in more, and we become more interesting! Adopting this mindset creates fertile ground for healthy decision-making in life, relationships and our finances.

Sahil Bloom, from The Curiosity Chronicle, recently shared a collection of awesome ways to expand our curiosity and become lifelong learners.

Build a learning engine

The “learning engine” is at the core of every lifelong learner. Essentially, it comprises all the knowledge sources that we regularly consume. These could be books, audiobooks, newsletters, podcasts, TED talks, documentaries, blogs… you name it! And, in the last two decades, the internet has opened access to it all.

Avoid noise bottlenecks

Consuming more information does not always equate to knowing more. As you consume more data, you may find the noise-to-signal ratio increases – we call this a noise bottleneck. It slows down our ability to assimilate what we’re learning. 

We should consume less, but consume intelligently.

Embrace all styles and levels of learning

There are different types of learning, and there are different levels of learning. Four common learning types identified early on in children are visual, auditory, kinesthetic, and reading/writing. 

Most people are a combination of these four styles, but more times than not, we have a preferred learning style. Trying to explore different ways to consume and assimilate information keeps our brains and bodies healthy and helps us move from surface learning (which is quick and easy) to deep learning (which takes more time to mature).

Seek mentors and coaches

Two big challenges to learning are blindspots and the lack of accountability. Coaches and mentors provide a trusted sounding board and hold the space in our lives to spur us on when we’ve been sitting still for too long.

Embrace Failures

As Thomas Edison once said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Lifelong learners recognize that failures are learning opportunities. They don’t fear them; they embrace them. Failure is not easy, and this is why when we persevere, we grow in strength, skill and knowledge.

Follow Your Curiosity

When you have a spark of curiosity, follow it. From preparing and eating healthier meals to discovering how you can steadily move from living in debt to living in surplus. From learning a new skill or adopting a hobby to expanding your knowledge of how your body, mind, and emotions work, be willing to go on that journey wherever your curiosity drives you.

When our minds are clear, focussed and fit, we can make better decisions. We can see our current situation more clearly and identify the future that we’d like to create.

Estate planning, wills and final testaments are not easy processes to navigate. Setting up life cover and considering what will happen to your family when you pass away can be deeply emotional and an experience many would rather avoid.

But as technology helps us create farewell videos, family portfolio galleries and digital vaults, it has made the experience a little less technical and considerably more emotionally engaging and fulfilling. 

However – we often plan for the event of our death alone. What if you and your partner pass together or in quick succession? Not only will your dependants need to charter the unknown territory of your physical assets and financial policies, but they will also need to deal with your digital assets and online accounts.

From online banking and social media to online shopping and digital subscriptions, most of us have anywhere between five and forty active accounts that will need to be closed, cancelled or managed in our passing.

And, all of these require passwords.

If you haven’t addressed this before, you can start today with a simple spreadsheet or table. You can print it out or set it up on your device, whichever makes more sense to you.

There are loads of apps (some free, some not) that can help you do this, but let’s take a look at a basic framework that covers the essentials and gets your thoughts aligned with what might happen to your passwords when you pass.

Set out four columns under the following headers:

1. Account (Facebook/National Bank/Netflix)
2. URL (this is the website address or link that you use to access your account)
3. Username
4. Password

You can always add more columns as you use the list a little more, these could include headers like:

1. Renewal date
2. Renewal/Monthly/Annual fees
3. ID number or personal identifying code for that supplier
4. Email (that is linked to that account)

You could also create groups for the different accounts to make it easier to update and work with going forward. Group categories would also make it easier for your partner or kids to find the relevant accounts easily.

These categories could be things like:

1. Email accounts
2. Banking
3. Business accounts
4. Internet/Cellphones
5. Entertainment
6. Social Media
7. Online Shopping

Our digital assets are still a very new area of estate planning that have not been fully explored, but if you have some good ideas on how you’d like your social media profiles to be treated or specific messages that you would like broadcast, these can be included in your planning.

But – almost all of these wishes depend on someone having access on your behalf; and for that they will need the four columns of the sheet that you’re about to set up! If you have more than ten accounts – just do ten today, and another ten tomorrow and another ten the day after until you’ve worked through everything. This will make it manageable and achievable.

We can’t change what happens to us, but we can change how we respond to what happens to us, and within us.

Everything ages, but not everything ages well. Some things can wither from the inside out if they do not have a well-developed resilience. Resilience is the ability to bounce back and withstand stressors. It is to have the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties.

For us, resilience is something that we need to work on actively. If we were lucky to have a loving environment to grow up in, we would have a certain amount of resilience from an early age. However, as soon as our communities begin to find ways to disqualify, exclude, challenge and limit us, our resilience will be challenged and reduced.

This is why we need to work on our resilience.

Resilience is linked to our sense of, or connectedness to, our wholeness. Building resilience means that we need to embrace all sides of ourselves (even the warty ones!). Connecting with the heart is at the core of finding and creating inner wholeness.

As Dr Rosenberg, a clinical psychologist, writes, “We are compassionate with ourselves when we are able to embrace all parts of ourselves and recognize the needs and values expressed by each part. Practicing self-compassion involves learning how to firstly practice self-care and secondly learning how to love yourself.”

This is also crucial in building financial resilience. Suppose we aren’t able to question and investigate how we feel about money. In that case, we will not succeed in promoting healthy habits, supporting a positive self-image, and fortifying resilient relationships.

On the lonerwolf.com website, they put it like this:

Wholeness and holiness are connected. Holy comes from the Old English word hālig, which means “whole, healthy, entire, and complete.” So to be whole means to be holy. Wholeness is holiness – and this is why when we have a direct experience of our wholeness it tends to feel like a mystical experience of awe, gratitude, love, and reverie.

But it’s not something reserved for mystics and people on lonely mountaintops. 

Wholeness, self-compassion, inner strength, confidence — resilience — are available to all of us. When we show up every day, helping to bring love and value to those around us, we can be resilient. When we make plans for our future and are forced to change those plans due to unforeseen changes, we can be resilient.

When we support our family through tough times or provide a safety net for our children, partners, or parents, we can be resilient.

It all begins with being kinder to ourselves; this is how we bounce back stronger.

Anything in life that is truly worth doing – is not easy. It is easy to forget this when we see others doing really well and making the difficult seem like a cinch. We don’t see all the hard work that goes into the background.

But in our own areas of expertise, we have had to start from level zero and apply ourselves over time to gain the knowledge and experience akin to being proficient.

When it comes to mindfulness, a key practice for our mental health, it feels like it’s something that should come naturally. All we need to do is focus our attention on the present moment, and we will be able to get it right. Mindfulness has been proven to calm the mind, ground the body, and increase overall well-being and good health, scientifically and spiritually.

We understand that it’s worth doing, but in practice, it’s not that easy. We get distracted, our thoughts run all over the show, and before we know it, we’re no longer practising mindfulness.

Mindfulness is an incredible tool to help us make better decisions around our finances, relationships, career and extracts more enjoyment and fulfilment from the activities that we love so much.

Here are a few ideas that we can all work on, gradually and steadily, to grow our mastery of mindfulness and make this journey a little easier.

DO EVERYTHING SLOWLY

Consciously slow down. Walk slowly, drink slowly, sit slowly, breathe slowly, talk slowly, move your body slowly — practice slowing down your natural tendency to rush everything. When we wake up to an alarm clock, judge our travel time by traffic flows, set meetings for productive hours in the day, watch the clock during dinners and keep trying to get to bed earlier, we’re living by the clock. And this will always leave us feeling rushed.

Slowing down helps us break the grip of ‘always feeling rushed’ and helps us focus on what we’re doing right now. When you slow your breathing – you’re focused on the air going in and going out. You’re probably doing it right now as you read this – and that’s a super start! You’re already more mindful.

Whenever your world starts to spin a little too fast, witness your breath and feel yourself begin to slow down.

LET EATING BECOME A SENSORY EXPLOSION

There’s a moment in the 2007 Disney movie, Ratatouille, where Remy and Emile taste some cheese that was struck by lighting. Visually, as Remy takes a bite, we see the background fade into a fireworks display, and his face shows the visceral delight in this new taste experience.

When we want to improve our mindfulness muscles, we can do it with every meal and snack during the day. As we slow those down (not eating on the run…), we can experience more of the flavour, texture and benefits of what we are putting in our bodies.

SPEND MORE TIME IN NATURE

We’ve said it many times in our blogs, spending time in nature is healing and helpful on so many levels. It boosts happy-hormones, improves our air intake, stimulates creativity and reduces emotional tension. But – it also makes mindfulness easier.

Living indoors all day tends to restrict the mind immensely. By going outside, we open our minds to experiencing more expansion and relaxation.

If we’re walking a little slower (let’s assume we’re not trying to get our lifestyle-plan points!), we will be able to commit to watching, smelling and hearing whatever comes into our field of stimulation. Experts say that doing this for at least half an hour a day is all we need to begin making mindfulness easier.

We can work on mindfulness of sounds, smells, flavors, feelings/textures, and what we see and start small. Focus on one mindfulness exercise and commit time to it each day. As this becomes easier, you can journal your experiences (this enhances mindfulness of a recent experience) and reflect on what you’ve learned or how you’ve changed. Be kind to yourself and have some fun with it!