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Life Long Learners {Episode 189}
622 Plays2 years ago
Interested in cultivating a love of learning for life in yourself? In Episode 189, Bonnie & Audrey share WHY it's a good idea to choose to continue learning your entire life. They give 5 of the best (and easiest!) tips on HOW to continue learning at whatever every age.
Mentioned in this episode:
Episode 33: Mom Brain
What is a Murph?
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About Outnumbered the Podcast:
Two moms, parenting a combined total of 19 kids and finding joy in the chaos.
Join Audrey and Bonnie as they share real parenting tips for real people through humor, advice and compassion.
Whether it's tackling how to teach kids to work or discussing where to turn when you're all out of patience, these two experienced moms are here to offer authentic tips for raising children joyfully.
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Transcript
Introduction & Host Backgrounds
00:00:07
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Outnumbered the Podcast. I'm Audrey. And I'm Bonnie. We are experienced moms to a combined total of 19 children. In our weekly episodes, we explore relatable topics using our perspectives of humor and chaos. Tune in for advice and encouragement to gain more joy in your parenting journey.
Sponsor Highlight: Magic Spoon
00:00:32
Speaker
Hey everybody, this episode is sponsored by Magic Spoon. You know, our family has been trying to cut down on carbs, sugar and unhealthy food. And there's some stuff that we really just can't eat anymore. So enter Magic Spoon cereal. This cereal is amazing. It comes in a variety pack of four flavors. The flavors are fruity, cocoa, frosted and peanut butter. Don't they sound delicious? But it has zero grams of sugar in the entire pack. 13 to 14 grams of protein and only four net grams of carbs.
00:01:02
Speaker
And that equals out to about 140 calories a serving. It's gluten-free, keto-friendly, grain-free, soy-free, and low carb. Pretty awesome. Yeah. It tastes exactly like the regular cereal from your childhood, but it is super nutritious. It's also delicious and super healthy cereal that brings joy to your mornings or afternoons or bedtime snacks. My kid's favorite flavor is the fruity. Yum. So good.
00:01:25
Speaker
Okay, so go to Magicspoon.com slash outnumbered to grab a variety pack of four and try it today. And be sure to use our promo code, which is outnumbered at checkout to save $5 off your order. Magic Spoon is actually so confident in their product that it's backed with 100% happiness guarantee. So if you don't like it for any reason, they'll refund your money, no questions asked. Remember, get your next delicious bowl of guilt-free cereal at Magicspoon.com slash outnumbered and use our code outnumbered to save $5.
00:01:51
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome back.
Lifelong Learning & Homeschooling
00:01:53
Speaker
And Bonnie and I are excited to talk to you about today's topic in episode 189. We're gonna be talking about what it means and how to become a lifelong learner. That's right. We as homeschoolers obviously appreciate and really value learning, but sometimes we spend so much time on our kids' educations that we forget to maintain our own learning and our own education. And we're not talking about going back to college, although that's great too,
00:02:20
Speaker
like that's the right decision for you, but just being someone who is always excited to learn new things. Okay. So before we get started, let's have a funny little humor segment. You guys, all my humor segments lately have to do with my three-year-old because he is hilarious. He's just got this little mouth on him that just rambles and rambles and rambles and always makes us laugh. He also still looks really like a baby. He's got really chubby cheeks and kind of a tiny mouth. So everybody thinks he's a lot younger than he is, so they get a kick out of his talking about.
00:02:46
Speaker
He is terrible at keeping track of his shoes, okay? His shoes are lost all the time. I think I've bought him four new pairs in the last like two months. I'm going nuts. It's so annoying. So when we were on our vacation recently, we thought we had left his shoes at a park. And I was just frustrated again at the prospect of buying him yet another pair and out, you know, on vacation, who knows where his store is, whatever. So I was kind of expressing my frustration and he started grumbling right alongside me like,
00:03:13
Speaker
These shoes, you know? So I said, oh, I'm so tired of this. And he said, I'm so tired of this. I said, we're going to have to buy you another pair, Dean. It's OK, Mom. I not need shoes. OK. So then when we found them, he was so excited. Like just, oh, we found them. We found them, Mom. We thought we lost them. We thought we left them at the park, but they was under the couch. And he's like shaking his hand, like laughing. The rest of us, I'm like, I'm so glad you're pleased because now you're not talking more.
00:03:43
Speaker
staple shoes to the feet, you know? I just did that, okay. Oh, I know. That is so cute. My three-year-old is in a similar stage and so cute. So cute.
Benefits of Lifelong Learning
00:03:55
Speaker
Okay, so first of all, we want to address the question, why? Why would you want to become a lifelong learner? You're a mom, you have so much to do. Why would you want to add this to your plate too? Well, guess what? Just as you usually associate learning with young, being a lifelong learner will keep you youthful.
00:04:17
Speaker
And there is something about keeping your brain active, warding off Alzheimer's, things that happen to old people forgetfulness. We have a whole episode about mom brain that's, you know, whatever. It's a thing. Well, I know we've got enough go at working against us. So being a lifelong learner is something that we can do to kind of like counteract this mom brain thing that we've got going on, but also just, you know, add a youthful aspect to our own lives.
00:04:44
Speaker
Yeah. And you know, sometimes when we talk about learning, the first thing we think of is structured school. And that's hard, especially if you went too many years of structured school, cause you might have a lot of negative memories of like cramming for college tests. I remember after graduating from college, I don't think I read a book for fun for probably four years because I was so tired of being forced to read, but I didn't even do it for fun. So that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about exciting learning, right? So my why behind being a lifelong learner is
00:05:11
Speaker
that it's fun. It's exciting to learn new things and to open doors. It helps me personally love my life more. When things get a little boring, I'm like, I want to learn something new. I want to pick up a new skill or I want to read a new book or just open, open my horizons a little bit, especially when I'm stuck at home with kids. It just kind of makes life more exciting.
00:05:32
Speaker
Okay. You know what? That is a really good point that I didn't even think of for this episode. But you're right. It's fun because nobody else is dictating what you get to learn when you're an adult. You decide that. It's actually kind of like homeschooling.
00:05:49
Speaker
Except you've already done, you know, all the reading, writing, arithmetic, all that thing that, you know, all those things that are required for higher education or whatever. But now as a lifelong, as an adult, being a lifelong learner, that means that you get to decide what you're going to learn. And that's really what makes it fun. That's pretty awesome.
Tips for Lifelong Learning
00:06:06
Speaker
So today we have five tips on how, how to become a lifelong learner. And we're going to share these with you if this or why has convinced you that you too should try to become a lifelong learner.
00:06:18
Speaker
So number one is stay curious, you guys. We almost always start our episodes here in mental space. And here we are again, doing thought work in our mind. But stay curious, this is in your mind. You have to want to learn.
00:06:34
Speaker
to look forward to it, for it to have benefits for you. For you to even, you know, the rest of these tips to work for you. First of all, gotta start in your mind and stay curious. Like, what's going on in your mind about learning something? What we're not trying to do, like Adri was saying, is we're not trying to give you one more thing to do, but rather this is something for us that we can really enjoy and can make life so much more exciting and fun for us. And so a little bit different aspect to this is
00:07:03
Speaker
how do you respond to your kid's curiosity? So if a kid comes up and says, hey mom, why does that bird look different than this bird? Or why does it sound different? Or why does this tree grow this way? Or why does dust come into our house? How does that work? If you respond in a loving, appreciative, like encouraging way, you should do the same thing for your own curiosity, right? If it feels like a bird and then maybe you're thinking about it in the wrong way, right? Or maybe you even look at your own curiosity as drudgery, right? Or you kind of tamp it down to like,
00:07:33
Speaker
Encourage it and let it grow and be excited about your own curiosity is a great place to start being more of a lifelong learner. Yeah, that is so true. I think my five-year-olds starts every single sentence with the word why.
00:07:50
Speaker
Why does or how come? That's her like number two. But she's so curious right now. It's every single thing she wants to know. And sometimes I'm just like, I don't know. Go ask your dad. Leave me alone. Right. But sometimes I'm like, you know what? That is a really cool question to ask. That's a really cool way to be looking at life is through this
00:08:15
Speaker
Like, she doesn't know the reason, so everything is kind of like fluid out there, so she didn't know why. And she wants to know. So, Joanna Gaines is famous for saying, very well known, saying, she says, calls her husband Chip, the most curious person on the planet. Well, I think my husband would be the second most curious person on the planet. If hers is the first, Chip's the first, mine's the second. This man that I'm married to is so incredible. He takes...
00:08:42
Speaker
Well, first of all, start with our kid's curiosity. He loves to answer all their questions, all their why questions, but he's also a little devious about it. Like he can see it from a kid's perspective. He hasn't lost like the magical, you know, okay, so we're driving by a sawmill. Dad, how do they get the logs to this sawmill? And instead of answering the true question, he makes up this big, huge story about
00:09:04
Speaker
tunnels being drug underground and gnomes having to drag the logs through the tunnel. And that's why you never see any log trucks coming into this factory, only log trucks going out. And he's still got, I'm not going to say the mind of a child, but he hasn't lost that spark of curiosity that he can see it as a child. Why not? Why not? Is it being drug in by gnomes underground? And they've built tunnels and all this.
00:09:30
Speaker
My kids get so into it. They're like, oh, cool. Can we go can we go through them sometime? Can we go see the tunnels? Yeah. And it sounds like like I was saying, he hasn't lost his sense of fun when it comes to curiosity. Right. And well, let's see. What do you think? Let's explore it a little bit. Let's have some fun with it. Right. And adults in general, and I would say probably especially moms, because we have so much on our plate.
00:09:54
Speaker
we tend to leave fun for like dead last. Unless you're one of those really awesome fun personalities, like you're a yellow, right? And you just don't have fun. For most of us, it's like, well, we're so busy, fun comes last. And so I'm not gonna sit and make up a story about it. I'm just gonna answer a question quick and we're gonna go on to bedtime because that's what needs to happen right now.
00:10:10
Speaker
I know, I know. Because there's like 18 things on my list, on my to-do list, in my mind. And I'm checking through, how many can I get done before the end of the day? And log trucks, I don't know, just whatever. And making up a story about gnomes is not on the list. But maybe it should be, you know? Maybe you should. And maybe that would be helpful for you if you find yourself kind of pigeonholed into this, the job of, you know, get all the things done. Maybe you need to add it to your list. Have some fun. Read a book, right? Learn something new. Love it.
00:10:38
Speaker
Okay, so first tip is stay curious. Second tip is to seek out opportunities for learning. Again, this sounds like more work, but if you really allow your curiosity to blossom, it's gonna be fun. It's gonna be something that you're looking forward to. And the opportunities really are everywhere if you look for them. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Once you've done that mental work and you're operating from a position of curiosity, almost everything can become a learning experience. Okay, so you're out on a nature walk. Gather leaves.
00:11:07
Speaker
take pictures of things, go back home, look them up, learn about things, and then even expand it from there. Do they have this kind of bug on the other side of the planet? How come it's here? How come it's not there? How long is this life cycle? I mean, there's opportunities everywhere if you're looking for them. Once you're in that position of curiosity, it's kind of cool to see where and what you can learn.
00:11:33
Speaker
Yeah, and maybe you can tie these opportunities into your existing to-do list if you're just feeling overwhelmed, right? But you want to have this lifelong learner attitude.
00:11:41
Speaker
Maybe you really liked chemistry in high school and you decide that you want to learn about the chemistry of cooking, right? You want to figure out why cakes rise or why your meals come out the way they do if you boil versus roasting vegetables, right? And you could get your kids involved. That could be really fun too. But there are lots of opportunities to do this in a way that makes life easier on you and not harder is what I'm saying.
00:12:06
Speaker
I personally really like to follow my curiosity in a number of ways like when I start thinking about something I like to just kind of run with it mostly because sometimes I just need to daydream during the day it's like my escape you know so if I'm curious about something I'll just kind of let it flow very often it's something creative like I think what would happen if I tried this or this in the kitchen or this or this
00:12:26
Speaker
sewing or this or this with artwork. Sometimes it's learning about learning styles for my kids. That's something I'm really passionate about because I help them to learn. Another thing that I've let myself just really dive into are just books and podcasts about anything. I do a lot of life coaching stuff. I do a lot of historical fiction that's really fascinating to me. So these are just topics that enter my mind and I find myself playing with them and I think, yeah, I'm gonna learn more about that. And that's how I fill my brain with exciting things that make me
00:12:55
Speaker
want to learn more about them. Right, exactly. If you have time to read a book, or book reading is something you enjoy, read a book that, you know, instead of just zoning out, I mean, you know, there's time, so we need to do that. But instead of zoning out on something that doesn't, isn't educational,
Learning with Children
00:13:13
Speaker
try, try something that doesn't have to be a boring, dry textbook. So maybe you read a historical fiction instead of a
00:13:20
Speaker
regular fantasy fiction or something. Or a fun documentary can be your winding down time in the evening or something. Yeah. Okay. So moving on to number three, learn right alongside of your kids. So your kids are in the stage where they have to learn. They don't get to learn, they have to learn. So as they are getting their education, whether they go to a public school, private school,
00:13:43
Speaker
or you're homeschooling them, they're getting their education from you, they will learn things that you don't know, promise. Even if you're homeschooling in them and you are the teacher, they will learn things that you don't know. So learn right alongside of them. Yeah, kind of like what I was talking about when my curiosity leads me to a place where I think my kids might also be interested. It's fun to learn together because then we're both getting the benefit of it, right?
00:14:11
Speaker
Okay, so one great way to do this is to stay abreast of new information in technology, right? So any day of the week you can Google something about NASA or what's happening in outer space, the new frontier for technology or architectural digs or anything kind of current events type thing along one of these subjects that's constantly changing and you can learn something new. Did you guys know they just dug something up in Saudi Arabia that
00:14:41
Speaker
changed what they thought about XYZ. So fun. And you're basically just learning, well, really both about current events as well as some major important field that your kid might end up going into. Who knows? Yeah. Yeah. I remember when I took biology in high school, my teacher, there was two things that prevented me or that caused me to hate that experience. One was that that teacher hated teaching. I mean, it just came through, right? Sometimes you run into that.
00:15:10
Speaker
And the other thing was it was taught from a secular point of view. And I had a very Christian or theological Bible-based worldview. And so those two were at odds and I had to choose which one I was going to believe. So what I ended up doing was learning the material to pass the test, opening my brain on the way out the door and doing a dump, right? So just get rid of this. I don't want to know all this stuff anymore. Put the field in the right.
00:15:37
Speaker
boxes and got past the class. So when my kids started learning biology through our homeschool, I was so intrigued. It was a lot of the same information, but from a biblical worldview and even a
00:15:57
Speaker
a worldview that was just neutral. It wasn't like some topics in schools get taught very politically or from one worldview or another. Well, just neutral, just presenting the facts of science. I was so intrigued and it was so fun. The first set of my kids that went through biology, I was like, get out of the way. I'm looking through this microscope. I'm dissecting this frog. This is the coolest thing ever.
00:16:29
Speaker
I was going to say that kind of reminds me of when I first went to college, I went to a church school and it was the other way around for the first time I was given an opportunity to see history, science, et cetera, in the context of a religious base. And not that it wasn't taught to me like that as a kid, but I was in homeschool. So I was just taught, you know, what the public school taught me. And it was so fascinating to all of a sudden
00:16:52
Speaker
see history in this different paradigm. And so, yeah, maybe there's a hole in your education like that, right? Or maybe there's some something you've really felt interested in, but you didn't get the right kind of education about it as a child. It's a great thing to dive into now. Yeah. Here's another example. I'll bet your kids are being taught math differently than you are taught math just because the right way to teach math changes all the time. And so instead of
00:17:20
Speaker
hating it and saying, I don't know, I can't help you with your math homework. I didn't learn it this way. I can't do this. Why not learn the new method? It's still the same math. One plus one equals two. It doesn't matter how you're getting, like how you're getting there is just different from the way that you were taught when you were a kid. But the actual math doesn't change. So why not learn a new style right along with them? It's not going to hurt you. Yeah. And it actually might make things a lot easier. I remember reading a book about how
00:17:49
Speaker
why many Asian cultures are considered to be much better at things like math. And they said one of the reasons was because the way most Asian languages count is much more logical than the way we count in English,
Exploring New Challenges
00:18:03
Speaker
right? And so they count like 10, 1, 10, 2 for 11, 12. We learn all new words for 11, 12, 13 that is not very logical. If you say 13, a little kid is not going to know that's 10 and 3, right? So because of that,
00:18:17
Speaker
They're even early on very, it's much easier for them to get these early math concepts. And I thought, well, shoot, I'm gonna teach my kids a different language then, or maybe in learning this new way of adding and subtracting and multiplying, it can make things a little bit easier on us, right? We can all use mental math, help. Okay, fourth tip is to challenge yourself. This is one that's hard for us because our lives are so full. We're like, oh, I just wanna veg in front of the TV or a good book at the end of the day, not really challenged myself.
00:18:47
Speaker
If you can find a topic that you know nothing about and find some curiosity to learn about it, that can be a great place to start, especially if you're starting from ground zero or it's something that you've even considered to be a weakness of yours.
00:18:58
Speaker
Yeah, this one is a really good one, guys. It's not only your mental or your subject's learning, but what about physical? Challenge yourself to learn something new physically. So maybe you've never done rock climbing before. When you go to learn that, if you've never done it before, your brain will explode.
00:19:17
Speaker
Try yoga if you've never done yoga before try swimming if you've not done, you know or try a new stroke learning a new stroke swimming spiritual learning I think that we will never run out of things in life to learn in the spiritual realm to challenge yourself to instead of what it's something I love to do is instead of just
00:19:39
Speaker
reading my chapter in the Bible in the morning, like digging into something. Like I have done so many, I'm a list maker. So I even do this in the spiritual, when I'm doing spiritual studies as well. So I'll find something that I want to study or something that has been laid on my heart to study. And I'll just go study in depth and start making lists and tracking things. And
00:20:04
Speaker
Not that it makes me a better person, but I am challenging myself. Like I don't think spiritually will ever be like, oh yeah, I learned it all. Yeah. And in the subjects that aren't necessarily spiritual, things are always changing. Like we're like, well, we know everything there is to know about biology. Oops. Nope. We got all of a sudden new technology and microscopes. And now we know more about the South. So there's more things to learn, right?
00:20:24
Speaker
As far as the spiritual stuff goes, one thing that is fun for me, and I did this a lot before kids when I had more time to study, but is I would come up with a topic that I really wanted to learn more about, like faith or something. And then I would just dive into church books or scripture or whatever and different sermons and find everything that I could about faith and just write it all down. And the benefit was not only was I really, really in-depth learning about this really important topic,
00:20:48
Speaker
But then anytime I needed to teach a lesson or something at church, I had all this wealth of knowledge ready. I'd already done my research, you know. That was really fun because instead of just having kind of surface level understanding, you really dive deep. It's kind of like going to a seminary or something, you know? Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty awesome. I wanted to go back to physical for a second. So I have to bring up my curious husband again. So he decided that for his 50th
00:21:16
Speaker
birthday, he wanted to be able to do a MRF. And he, with his work, interfaces with a lot of military people. And he'd heard them discussing a MRF, what a MRF is. You can go look it up. It's a certain number of pull-ups, push-ups, running. I think I'm missing something else in there.
00:21:35
Speaker
air squats, and you do so many, and you do it under a certain time to be able to qualify for whatever. It's a military thing. And so he decided on his 50th birthday, he was going to do a MRF, just to challenge himself physically. And at the beginning, he was nowhere near being able to do a MRF, but he just started, and he challenged himself. So I really respect that spark of curiosity that he's never lost.
00:22:05
Speaker
Yeah, maybe 13 years ago, right after my daughter was born, I decided that I really wanted to do a triathlon. And I started looking into those. They were scary to me because I could run. I could do a race. That's not hard. But to figure out a bike and all the right gear and the right swimming strokes and everything was scary. And that was a really fun challenge for me. So every couple years, I'll think, you know, I haven't done one in a while. I need to remind myself that my body can do things that I want to push myself to. And it keeps you in good shape, too. So that's a bonus.
00:22:36
Speaker
You know, homeschooling in particular for me has been very good because I have to stay on top of certain subjects, you know, or I get reminded constantly, it's like, I might not have a great eighth grade education, but I'm constantly good right around the fourth, fifth level, because that's like what I have to teach you over and over and over, past that level, they're pretty good on their own, but it's so great to remind myself, oh yeah, geometry, that was a sticking point for me, here, let me help you figure it out, let's work on it together.
00:23:03
Speaker
And especially, you know, the topics that were hard for me, but also repairs around the home or for the car are a great thing to learn.
Self-Reliance Through Skills
00:23:12
Speaker
along with your children as well, like, oh, you know what? The car's making this weird noise. Let's Google it. Let's YouTube it. Let's find out what might be the solution. I mean, I don't recommend doing anything dangerous or that might break your car if you don't know what you're doing, but we've saved tons of money repairing home appliances just on YouTube, you know? And it's just so fun to learn how these things work and help yourself be a little more self-reliant.
00:23:34
Speaker
Yeah, you want to feel like superwoman, your dishwasher breaks down, repair it, woohoo! Yeah, for just $15 for the part that you ordered, right, instead of $150, yeah. Yeah, or a whole new dishwasher, like we're talking in the thousands, right? Yeah.
00:23:50
Speaker
All right, so our last tip for you, number five, is surround yourself with fellow learners. Now, I am lucky because I'm married to a second most curious person on the planet. But the point here is that if you're surrounding yourself with learners, if others are learners, they will inspire you too.
00:24:09
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, totally. This is why book clubs are great, right? You want to learn something new, grab a couple of friends and say, hey, let's read this book together and learn about it. Or let's take this course together. I'm kind of an online course junkie. If I see a Facebook ad that intrigues me, I'll be like, yes, give it to me. I want to learn all the things. Totally sounds interesting, right? And ask yourself, the people that you spend the most time with, you know, accepting your family because you can't really control them.
00:24:34
Speaker
Your friends, associates, do they drag you down or are they the kind of people that inspire you to do wonderful things? I have a couple of friends in my life that are so inspiring. Every time we talk, they've got some project or some cool thing that they're doing and I'm so inspired to do something similar, right? And then ask yourself, what kind of effect do you have on your friends? Are you the kind of person that only ever wants to talk about what TV show you've been watching or are you learning and growing and inspiring those around you to learn and grow as well?
00:25:04
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, that is so true. I mean, a good old gripe session with your gal pals might feel great, but I mean, it might seem like really cool at the time, but then how are you feeling afterwards after that? You're just like, yeah, that was kind of a waste of time.
00:25:20
Speaker
Oh, so one thing both Bonnie and I have here is we have the sewing community. And so when I don't know, I can't speak for Bonnie here, but when I found the sewing community, other women that sew online, and they were sewing these gorgeous things. So I didn't know how to sew, but I knew how to sew. I was like, okay, time to start learning. If these women can do it, I can do it. And somebody would post, you know, a pair of
00:25:43
Speaker
gorgeous pair of jeans that they'd made and they'd done the rivets and it looked like, you know, as sewists, we're always trying to make it look like we didn't make it, right? So how can we make it look not homemade, handmade, but not homemade? And so I'd be like, okay, I need a new denim skirt. I am going to learn how to pound in rivets and get all the supplies and make myself one. And then, you know, people compliment
00:26:08
Speaker
something I was wearing and I'd be like, yeah, I made it. And they were like, no way. Like, yeah, they come with it. Yeah, that's the best.
00:26:18
Speaker
Yes, that is such a great example because it's useful and it's something that with lots and lots of opportunity for growth and learning. I remember getting to a point where I felt really confident in my sewing and thought, I want to learn about patterns. I want to learn how to make patterns. I want to learn how to adjust things. If I have a pattern and I know that it's a little bit too narrow here or too wide here, how do I adjust that? What do I do? And got to diving into that and learning how to design my own patterns. And that was just fascinating. The cool thing about learning is that not only does it broaden you mentally, but it
00:26:48
Speaker
In many areas, it will increase your skills as well. We've talked about self-reliance before and we're going to talk about it again, but the feeling of being able to care for yourself in one way is so powerful. Knowing that you can produce your own food or knowing that you can
00:27:06
Speaker
run your own home off the electricity you produce or sewing your own clothes. I feel pretty dang confident that if the crap hit the fan and the world shut down, my family would be clothed because I can take care of that. We might not have any food because I haven't figured out the gardening part, but it's just such a powerful thing to develop the skill and knowledge of something that is essential to survive. So fun, love it.
00:27:33
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. Sewing is such an empowering thing, like making your own clothes and making them fit and yeah. Yeah, I too think like, I...
00:27:45
Speaker
I was being interviewed the other day for a sustainable sewing article that someone was writing, and they were like, so, you know, do you think sustainable sewing, it kind of costs more, it takes more time than fast fashion. And I was like, no, no, no, don't you, like we can change the world. Like teaching sewing to our kids, we can like change the trajectory of the future. Like if they can produce their own clothes, they don't need fast fashion. And that's one way that we can kind of undermine the whole, you know, chain is by teaching our kids to produce it themselves.
00:28:14
Speaker
Yeah, it's pretty empowering. And it's like, we're talking about sewing, but really you can apply it to anything that you learn about. Like Bonnie and I get really excited when we're talking about sewing because it's something that we've stayed curious and become lifelong learners about.
00:28:28
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And don't be afraid. Some of my final thoughts include this. Don't be afraid of frustration or failure. Okay? So one of the reasons I think that we stop learning after a while is because of the challenge aspect. Because it's not easy. It requires a little bit of work, a little bit of learning, and it requires some
Embracing Failures in Learning
00:28:45
Speaker
failure. Now, personally, I hate that word because if I think of my last sewing project as a failure, then I just want to go cry under a pillow and eat cookies.
00:28:52
Speaker
Instead, I just think, well, that didn't work. Or, oh, I'm going to have to try something new next time. Or this fabric didn't stretch the way I anticipated. But every time I mess up, I learn. And I cannot think of the last time that I sewed something start to finish without a goof. It just happens every time, which is why sewing is such
00:29:08
Speaker
a great skill set because you mess up constantly and people who are new sewers get to call me and tell me, I'm just so frustrated because I just keep messing up. I'm like, welcome to the club. Sounds like you're sewing. That is part of the learning process, the mess ups, the challenges, the failures, and then the subsequent successes afterwards.
00:29:27
Speaker
To review our five tips for being a lifelong learner are staying curious, seeking out opportunities for learning, learning alongside your kids, they make everything fun. Challenge yourself and then surround yourself with fellow learners.
00:29:40
Speaker
Yes, those are so good. And I just want to bring up one more thing about my curious husband is that I have watched him through the entire 26 years of our marriage do a deep dive on something. So he'll decide he's interested in something and pretty soon books start coming in and materials start coming in. And next thing I know, he's got copper and he's learning how to burn it and do chasing and rape you say, which is, you know, the shaping of it. And I'm like,
00:30:06
Speaker
Wow. And what's really cool about all these deep dives is that, you know, he's not out there in copper working today. It's not like his his career. It's not like his hobby. He's not making too many and money off of it. But we have all the materials and he has all the knowledge from this deep dive that should one of our kids be like, hey, I want to do something with copper.
00:30:26
Speaker
Boom. Dad's got them started. Okay. Read these books. Watch these videos. Here's the material to start with. Here's the tools. Oh, and I learned this. Don't do this. You know, try this. Like, I like to relabel failure as lessons.
00:30:41
Speaker
Ah, learned a lesson there. So anyway, my thought is that, I think if I had to rate these the most important one would be go back to number one, stay curious. Like change the way you think about learning. It's not drudgery anymore. Cause you're not a kid in school. Nobody's forcing you to do it.
00:31:00
Speaker
So it becomes, it changes from the have to to the get to. And when you move from one position to the other of those two mentalities, then life will open up in a whole new way that you've never seen it before. I think you remember or...
00:31:16
Speaker
maybe a time in the far past or more recently when something new you were learning something new and you couldn't eat and you couldn't sleep and you were like eaten up you were like on fire because of this new thing and you wanted everything and you were noticing everywhere and you were like so that's that's what we want for you we want we want it for us and we want it for you and that's one of the biggest benefits of being a lifelong learner
00:31:40
Speaker
Yes, and we would love to hear what you're into learning these days or what deep dives you've
Community Engagement & Conclusion
00:31:44
Speaker
taken. So you guys should come tell us on Instagram. Get on Instagram this week and let us know if there's something that you have loved learning or that you would love to learn. Maybe there will be someone else who knows something about it can get you started. That's it for this week's episode. I'm Audrey. And I'm Bonnie and we're Outnumbered.
00:32:03
Speaker
Thanks for listening friends. Click the link in the show notes to subscribe to our email and never miss another episode. Show us some love by leaving a review on iTunes or sharing the podcast with a friend. Thanks for all your support. We'll talk to you next week.