Would you start a business just to learn new things? I never intended to, but it seems like that’s what happened…
When I started Play In The Zone, it was a buzz. But it was also overwhelming.
Everything was new. Running my own business. Having to sell things. Having to create and publish online.
What were all the things that worked? How would I ever find an audience? Did I have any right to call myself an expert in this sort of thing?
And, the more I dived into the different areas, the more I realised I had to learn.
Selling and marketing — merely individual words to me at the start — revealed fractal depths: emails, copywriting, sales pages, webinars, social media, adverts, etc etc.
There was a whole new world for me to master. And my future livelihood depended on it.
I should have felt like I was drowning. But, instead I felt… Energised?
I used to get up every day and throw myself into whatever needed work — excited to learn stuff. And I discovered I was absorbing new information and skills at an unprecedented rate.
So much so that my conversation was confusing friends. It was peppered with terms and ideas that I hadn’t even known existed six months before.
Gradually, it dawned on me that this was no fluke. Yes, I was lucky that I’d discovered I actually liked a lot of the marketing skills (who’d have guessed from my previous life as a very non-entrepreneurial civil servant?).
But, more than that, I’d unwittingly created a perfect learning environment for myself. A situation where I was incentivised to learn new things and apply them at rapid pace and with constant timely feedback.
It’s the sort of setup which means it’s almost hard for you not to improve.
So let’s see how it worked so successfully.
When you’re running your own business there’s no use for simple theory. You’ve GOT to put ideas into practice for them to have any use.
But not only was I forced to learn by doing. The small scale of my business setup gave me immediate feedback on what was working or not. Whether that was through revenue, likes, followers, or whatever. And it’s fast, specific feedback that’s one of the biggest drivers of learning.
There was also infinite chance for me to experiment. Since the business was so new, I was free to mould it into any shape I wanted.
Previously, I’d always been following a curriculum — created by someone else and designed to get me to one single end point. So there was little, if any, choice of which crazy insights and new ideas to explore.
But now suddenly I was placed slap bang in a whole new ocean that I’d never know existed before. Everywhere I looked I found ideas to explore and skills to learn.
I was able to treat learning as an adventure playground rather than a classroom. I got to pick the most fun and exciting experiments rather than being forced into staying in some very strict lines.
But at the same time there were real consequences that set stakes that kept me sharp. If I got things right then the business would grow and I’d have money. If I didn’t, then it wouldn’t.
However, nothing I did was going to destroy the business in one fell swoop. So there was no fear of individual failure. I could keep going and testing and iterating to find out what worked.
Not only did the environment encourage exploration, discovery was my entire motivation for being there in the first place.
I didn’t get into the business game (I realised when I looked back) because I was so excited for this to be the perfect job for me. Rather, I was curious to see whether I could make it work. It was a puzzle I felt challenged to solve.
So I’d actively seek out new courses to take and devour them greedily. I couldn’t wait to try out the ideas in there. My notebooks were bursting to overflowing with more plans than I could possibly follow through on.
Finally, I was in control of everything. Having autonomy meant that I was much more motivated to take charge of my own learning — rather than having tasks forced upon me, or abdicating responsibility to someone else.
However, I wasn’t left on my own to sink or swim. I had access to courses to start out with. And, later, to mentors for personal guidance and support.
So, to recap:
If you really want to supercharge your learning then don’t try and artificially bolt on the latest scientific techniques and learning hacks. Instead, look to set up an environment that automatically and organically prioritises the helpful behaviours.
Seek out a project that excites and intrigues you in itself (rather than one where you merely want the outcome). Turn it into a sandbox that allows you to test things out in millions of practical iterations. Make sure it provides you with immediate clear feedback. Have that feedback involve real consequences (but nothing that hurts too much). And take the lead yourself but make sure you’ve got specialist advice and support to lean on too.
If you’re just about to start out, think about how you can build in some of those components I’ve outlined.
If you’re already going, what changes can you make to deliver more of those things?