Last year, I spent some time working on a project that would help to automate some tasks at work. The end result is a tool with a user interface that can be used on a desktop/laptop computer. It has a handful of menus designed to run some specific tasks. I won’t be winning a Nobel Prize for it by any means, but following a period of not using the tool for some time, the other day I came back to it, and as I observed how each component works together to achieve something useful (in my eyes at least), it led me to ponder whether I’d be able to recreate it should I happen to lose it for whatever reason.
You’ve likely heard the expression “You never forget how to ride a bike”. We know it to stem from the idea that once you learn how to ride, you never forget, even if years were to pass without so much as stepping on one. What we might often miss however, are the inevitable wobbles that going years without riding will have. You never forget how to ride a bike, but that isn’t to say the person who hasn’t ridden since childhood will have the same confidence as the person who cycles to work every day.
This is what came to me as I briefly thought about work I’ve accomplished in the past. As of today, I’m confident that I’d be able to recreate my previous work in some form; however, how long would it take me to get there? How many “wobbles” would I experience along the way, and would it be worth it?
The work I’ve personally accomplished isn’t particularly impressive, but I do find it interesting to offer a thought to the idea that just because time is moving forward, and we see developments in various aspects of our lives such as in healthcare, transport and food production etc, there are no guarantees of those things getting continuously better.
Now that’s a somber thought, but bear with me. I, just like anyone else, simply can’t profess to know if the examples I’ve given will get better or worse in the future to any degree of certainty. But what we do know is that almost every person alive in 100 years time will be different from everyone alive today. Unless you’re an extremely durable centenarian, it’s not likely you’ll be around.
One of the things this means is that the knowledge and skills we have in this present moment are not guaranteed to be passed on to someone else. Perhaps the skill is no longer useful, and someone from a later generation has found a better way to reach the same/similar goal. An example of this could be the know-how in reading a paper map. Real-time directions in Google Maps negate the need to open a paper map at all in most cases. In another scenario, knowledge could be lost by failing to pass it onto someone who might find it useful. To offer a more extreme example, let’s suppose that a nuclear physicist has spent his entire life working on a solution to produce unlimited clean energy using nuclear fusion. Most of his notes are stored on paper. His passing unfortunately results in never quite solving the problem. However, he did write down his theories that work heavily towards it’s progress. Unfortunately, his best work had been accomplished outside the lab in his home office. He didn’t make a backup of this work, and his children without understanding it’s importance, threw out the box containing the paperwork.
That work is lost forever. Someone may replicate something close to it, or even something better in the future, but there are no guarantees. For now, we must accept the reality that something good has been lost.
Now, nobody would be at any great loss if they were to lose the tool I’ve developed. But if we do care to preserve something, even just for personal use throughout our lifetime, it’s unlikely that attempting to maintain it in our mind, or on loose paper would do.
In part, this is the reason I started a blog to begin with, to preserve the thoughts held at certain points in time. Others might keep a diary or a journal. That was the case with my Grandpa in his younger days. When I visit, he’ll often reminisce about his working life and the changes that he’s seen over the last 60 years or so. Sometimes, he’ll reference his journal if we’re talking about something from a particular point in time. On one occasion, I can’t recall exactly what we were talking about, but he opened his journal and began to read an entry from when he was much younger. The passage began by listing the time he woke up that morning and the time he left for the train station. Only a few seconds into his narration my Grandpa exclaimed “My word, I’m a boring fellow aren’t I!”. I couldn’t help but to subtly chuckle at that.
Although, I also found it strangely familiar. Not the logging of his wake up times, but the idea of looking back on something and having a different viewpoint to how you thought about it originally. And whilst my Grandpa looked back on this particular log somewhat unfavourably, there are plenty of other examples where he would look back with fondness. Memories, thoughts and feelings that had been lost to the mind, but brought back to life by a personal passage written in the past.
Some time ago, I read Chris Bailey’s book entitled “Hyperfocus”. One of the topics he discusses is the idea of letting your mind wander from time to time. He defines this using the term “Scatterfocus” – a way of “directing your attention inward”. I thought an example provided was interesting when he wrote:
“Think back to your last creative insight – chances are you weren’t hyperfocusing on one thing. In fact, you probably weren’t focused on much at all. You may have been taking an extra long shower, having a walk during a lunch break, visiting a museum, reading a book, or relaxing on the beach with a drink or two. Maybe you were sipping your morning coffee. Then, like a flash of lightning, a brilliant idea struck out of nowhere”
Hyperfocus | Chris Bailey
Now Chris’ explanation of “Scatterfocus” is just an abstract idea. But regardless, it resonated with me, because if I do occasionally have a somewhat out-of-the-box idea, it hasn’t been the result of persistently focusing on a problem. It’s occurred when I’ve been relaxed, often when I don’t have any particularly urgent tasks to finish at work.
I’d imagine everyone let’s their mind wander from time to time. In my experience, the only way I can describe it is by having seemingly random thoughts float around in my head. Sometimes two or more of those thoughts will link together to spark something new. This often happens without realising, but if I attempt to focus on it, perhaps I might visualise the low fuel light in my car which I need to remember to fill up sometime. I then think about why I need to put fuel in my car. I then think about energy. I then think about the time a friend almost collapsed from breathlessness on a Mountain Bike trail, and suddenly, I’ve sparked an idea on how I might fix the reverse switch on my car.
It’s a daft example, and perhaps there isn’t much merit in it because of it’s randomness. But in any case, like in Chris Bailey’s quote above, we must reach a concept somehow, and when we have that concept, it provides a foundation for the idea we’re aiming to work on.
The Merriam Webster dictionary describes a concept as:
“an abstract or generic idea generalized from particular instances”
Concept Definition & Meaning – Merriam-Webster
So the next time you have an idea, write it down. Perhaps you think it’s useless, and not worth preserving. Maybe that’s true. But one thing is for sure, it will never be thought out in the same way you’ve thought it out today. You never know, one day, it might be seen as useful after all.
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