Liftology 18: The role of reflection

If learning is action and reflection, and practice is action, what is reflection? I suggest that reflection is a big bucket, talking about the models and examples, and feedback, that are part of learning. But there’s another interpretation, and that’s the reflection on action that’s personal, and is more of elaboration of the ideas than the bigger picture. It takes personal experiences, and ties it to the other content. That’s what we’re talking about here.

The importance of activation of the new patterns in conjunction with other patterns is important. To the extent there’s overlap, the new patterns are strengthened when thinking about the familiar. The familiar patterns are strong, so activating the new patterns at the same time strengthens the new pattern and creates a greater likelihood for activation.

What is strong is your own experience. So, the ideal thing to activate is how the new information explains or informs things that you’ve previously experienced. What can you now understand that before had a less comfortable or desirable explanation, or none? That’s a useful bit of information.

We can connect to other things, but these salient experiences that are prompted by recall are ones that are stronger, and activate the underlying knowledge associated with the learning. That includes, by the way, things learned at work, so it can be relevant, but it can also be things from previous jobs, or from other aspects of life. Regardless, if it can be done, it’s useful. That’s worth asking about, at least.