The Genius of Being a Baby

Last week I wrote a post about Shoshin or Beginner's Mind. The idea is to maintain a child-like openness, and humility, towards ideas and knowledge.

This week I wanted to remind myself about the importance of baby steps. Because, let's be honest, the main reason I write this blog is to cement ideas in my own brain.

Like I said, last week, us adults have a tendency to turn our back on all things childish. We tend to prefer affecting an air of maturity and sophistication.

Of course, the paradoxical truth is that, often, the most sophisticated thing we can do is to avoid sophistication. 

This led me to reflect on the genius of being a baby. In particular, I was thinking about the critical importance of baby steps. And, closely connected to baby steps is the concept of small wins.

I think a big part of the problem is television/internet. When we see expert performance, on TV or online, it is understandable to assume the person has some natural ability. We do not see the countless baby steps they took.

Now, not all of us are interested in expert performance. Which is certainty fine. However, all of us, at some point in our lives, will experience real challenges and problems.

From marital problems, to addiction, to injustice, and beyond, the world is full of very real and very thorny problems. When dealing with hard problems we really need to remember the genius of baby steps and small wins.

Karl Weick is a professor at the University of Michigan. And, many years ago, he wrote an article titled "Small Wins." As Weick explains, one of the main reason to focus on small wins is to keep from becoming overwhelmed.

Weick said, "When the magnitude of problems is scaled upward in the interest of mobilizing action, the quality of thought and action declines, because processes such as frustration, arousal, and helplessness are activated."

What a pisser! What a conundrum!

What the professor is saying is there exists a tug-of-war between motivation and deflation. On the one hand, we might use the size of a problem to rally our energies. However, that same energy can easily grow too big and become overwhelming.

Enter the genius of small wins and baby steps. Colloquially, we have cliches like the idea that the journey of a thousand miles beginning with a single step. Or, eating an elephant one bite at a time. Or the saying, "Inch by inch is a cinch. Yard by yard is hard."

There are many ways to remember the importance of baby steps. For me, instead of running from our child-like qualities, I think it is wise to embrace them. How about you? How do you view small wins?