Live Like Spider-Man (Become World Class)
"The ability to perceive or think differently is more important than the knowledge gained." - David Bohm
Synthesis Of New Knowledge
I recently did a self-reflection assignment in a class of mine.
As the professor and I reviewed the assignment questions so I could better prepare my answers, we fell to discussing the meaning behind "synthesis of new knowledge."
Put simply, synthesis of new knowledge is not simply new information gained, but the context and the meaning of that information in relation to your existing views, ideas, skills, and knowledge.
The combination of the set of all previous memories and experiences combined with new information creates a new blend, synthesizing the information together.
This is why two different people can have the same external experience but radically different internal experiences. One can attend a concert and find it an inspiring, and life-changing experience, and another would find it loud and obnoxious based on her previous views, experiences, and opinions.
Power comes when you examine not just one event in a vacuum but surrounding events that influence or cause each other.
Learning is a much more complicated concept than most people think.
The remainder of this article will break down:
- What causes your current perceptions and how they can be influenced and changed
- How someone used this strategy to become President of the United States
- How the Spider-Man method is the ideal way to achieve your goals
- How you can take control of your script, narrative, story, environment, relationships, money, mindset, and ultimately your life
What you know is not contained in a vacuum. In reality, your knowledge is "colored" by your existing experiences. Thus, not just what we learn, but what we're learning in relation to the other things we're learning, is worth examining.
This is a higher order of thinking, involving multiple dimensions. Most people's views are limited, narrow, confined by linear patterns and repetitious thoughts.
This is because the "pre-frame" is often forgotten. This must be examined.
How We Learn
The concept of synthesizing new knowledge, the fact that new information is perceived differently based on preconceived notions and ideas, is largely the basis for Robert Cialdini's book, Pre-Suasion, which states that the first piece of information a person is given will radically influence the second piece.
"...pre-suasion, directing their minds to the moment before they experience the content. There's this interesting study. A guy goes to a shopping mall in France. And he tries to get women's phone numbers as they pass various shops, so he could call for a date. But in neither of those cases was he very successful. He only got a number 13 percent of the time. But there was one kind of shop that doubled his success rate when women were passing it, a flower shop. Why? Because flowers put women in the mind-set of romance." - Robert Cialdini
The information presented didn't change. The context, the environment, and the first pieces of information changed how additional information was perceived.
Your knowledge and wisdom compound. They do not simply accumulate. You form new connections and new ideas as new things are mixed between the neurons in your brain.
This is why Warren Buffett encouraged younger investors once to read five hundred pages per day. As he says, "That's how knowledge works. It builds up, like compound interest."
Information is not in a vacuum when it's delivered to the recipient. It's immediately sorted and organized in the brain contrasted against all the things you already know.
No two people have the same learning experience.
The experiences you have in the learning environment are not confined. They are radically influenced by the activities you do outside your place of education or work.
It's not just the raw understanding of new material that determines the experience each person has. It's the synthesis of it into that person's brain.
It's not what you know. It's the pre-frame before you learn it.
Your new experiences and new knowledge amplify, compound, mix with, and support your existing ideas.
How Trump Won The Election
In 2012, when Mitt Romney contested incumbent Barack Obama for the Presidency, Obama managed to portray him as a rich, elitist, out-of-touch character that would never understand the hearts of the American people.
Thus, when Trump, a billionaire, announced his candidacy in 2015, how did he manage to pull off convincing many Americans that he would understand, empathize, and help them?
Simple: he controlled the pre-frame.
In his candidacy announcement speech, he addressed his own success, signifying that because he is successful, he will lead America to prosperity and happiness.
"I'm really proud of my success. I really am...I'm doing that to say that that's the kind of thinking our country needs."
The information given in both elections, a rich guy runs for president, was exactly the same.
The angle, and the frame, was entirely different.
This is not a political discussion. It's a psychological one. Look closely around you, and you'll see that the most successful people control their pre-frame for how they look at themselves and how others look at them.
However you pre-frame yourself is how you will see yourself and how you will see the world.
What Is Your Lens?
"When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail" is not just a cute saying or common phrase. It's fundamental psychology.
The lens through which you view the world tends to determine your results.
Very few people ever stop to examine that lens.
Instead of carefully examining the way they view the world, most people employ confirmation bias, looking solely for new information that doesn't improve or analyze their existing belief but simply re-affirms and solidifies it.
Most people who think they're engaged in learning are in reality just telling themselves what they want to hear. They're not seeking new information, they're seeking permission.
"Your eyes can only see and your ears can only hear what your brain is looking for." - Dan Sullivan
99% of people see what they want to see.
Few are willing to embrace the honest truth.
Did you take control of your pre-frame?
2 Different Ladders
Lateral learning is the ability to take your pre-frames, your existing knowledge, and combine it with new learned knowledge and skills to create new connections.
When you approach a situation with pre-existing knowledge, and learn new knowledge, you have two groups of ideas and knowledge.
But you also have a third and emerging group of ideas that come about, which are the connections that take place.
This third group is a very powerful place.
Thus, by strategically mastering multiple skills, and spotting connections between diverse fields, you'll train your brain to work smarter, faster, and more creatively.
True mastery lies in understanding not just information or a skill but by spotting new and interesting connections between different bodies of knowledge and creating work based on those new connections.
Stephen Covey famously asked us to determine if our ladder of success was leaning against the right wall.
My question is, why aren't you scaling multiple walls?
Spider-Man wouldn't simply just climb up the side of one building at a time.
By using an interesting combination of webs and jumps, he would scale, swing through, and explore multiple buildings, or a whole town, very rapidly.
Success lies in ladder jumping like Spider-Man would. When you approach learning the Spider-Man way, you've mastered two skills at once, and you've gained a valuable third skill: that magical intersection of ideas and insights in between fields.
Make the commitment to be a polymath. Singular in purpose, multi-faceted in skills. Really cool things will start to happen.
Learn, master, and produce results like Spider-Man.
Take Control Of Your Lens
"Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right." - Henry Ford
Knowledge is power if used. Use this idea to serve you.
Most people use their pre-frames to stay trapped comfortably inside their own bubbles of knowledge, worldview, and development.
Very few people want to own the story that they're living or make changes to it.
You can.
You can strategically pre-frame yourself to remind yourself of your future self, who you truly want to be, with your journal, by surrounding yourself with the right people, and by putting yourself in the right places.
In The Alter Ego Effect, Todd Herman explains how you can tap into the identity of superheroes or role models, and start viewing the world through their eyes. This automatically shortcuts your weaknesses and accelerates your performance.
You can begin each day with the pre-frame of whoever you want to become.
You have to start viewing the world not through the eyes of lenses you've been automatically given by yourself, others, or fate, but through the lenses of who you want to be.
Change your frame, change your life.
Conclusion
What is your pre-frame?
What is your lens?
Do you have control of it?
Do you want to have control of it?
Do you own it?
How will it help you learn?
Are you mastering multiple things?
Are you a polymath?
Is this happening for you?
Learn. Master. Evolve.