Finding Your Element: How to Discover Your Talents and Passions and Transform Your Life

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In Fully Present: The Science, Art, and Practice of Mindfulness, Susan L. Smalley and Diana Winston argue that, 'Learning to live mindfully does not mean living in a perfect world, but rather living a full and contented life in a world in a world which both joys and challenges are givens. Although mindfulness does not remove the ups and downs of life, it changes how experiences like losing a job, getting a divorce, struggling at home or at school, births, marriages, illnesses, death and dying influence you and how you influence the experience...In other words, mindfulness changes your relationship to life.'" (p. 99) But I also meet people who absolutely love what they do and couldn’t imagine doing anything else. If you said, why don’t you stop this and try something else for change, they wouldn’t know what you’re talking about, because they’d say, “This isn’t what I do. This is who I am. This defines me. When I do this, I feel I’m in my most natural and authentic self.” Teaching is an art form. Great teachers know they have to cultivate curiosity, passion and creativity in their students. Ramsey Mussallam is a high school chemistry teacher, who shows how achievement soars when teachers fire the imaginations of their students with a true spirit of inquiry. Fear not: just embrace the next talent and find your Element for the second time. You can be more than one thing in life. A simple one-two-three program to find your Element

Finding Your Element” By Ken 8 Lessons Learned From Reading “Finding Your Element” By Ken

Written by one of the foremost educationalists of our time, Sir Ken Robinson, and his collaborator, Lou Aronica, “Finding Your Element” is a proper sequel to the pair’s tremendously successful debut titled “The Element.” Sir Ken Robinson still influences many through his writings. This self-development book shows how to find and appreciate your uniqueness – finding your element for inner happiness and satisfaction in life. That means, you need to find your passion. Passion is often confused with profession and hobbies. Passion is something you love with an overwhelming feeling of devotion and obsession. Passion is something that you love doing and help you enjoy your life. For some people, passion and profession could be the same. Finding your passion is all about finding your element. Chances are the junior will very soon become your superior if you keep feeling that way, and you’ll never improve your skills.At this point, most books would probably say something like “you need to change your attitude.” Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica advise something entirely different: change the job and find one that is more in tune with your natural aptitude.Furthermore, since they affect each other regularly, things change, and they change fast. Your job is to learn to improvise better, to generate enough energy, and create enough experiences to nudge the process in your direction. As the book quoted from Mark Twain, “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Tu îți creezi și recreezi propria viață. Folosește-te de creativitate și inventivitate pentru asta. Like the rest of nature, human talents and passions are tremendously diverse and they take many forms. As individuals, we’re all motivated by different dreams and we thrive—and we wilt too—in very different circumstances. Recognizing your own dreams and the conditions you need to fulfill them are essential to becoming who you can be. Finding your own Element won’t guarantee that you’ll spend the rest of your life in a constant unbroken state of pleasure and delight. It will give you a deeper sense of who you really are and of the life you could and maybe should live.” (pp. 242-243)

Finding Your Element summary - Blinkist Finding Your Element summary - Blinkist

Probably it’s best to think of “Finding Your Element” not so much as an enlightening book, but more as a book that may inspire you. After all, when it comes to stimulation and encouragement, a cliché or two put at the right place and worded the right way is known to help. The Element is where your natural aptitudes meet your personal passions. It could be playing the guitar, basketball, cooking, or teaching, working with technology or with animals – anything for which you have a natural feel. An essential step in finding your Element is to understand your own aptitudes. But being in your Element is more than doing things you’re good at. Many people are good at things they don’t really care for: to be in your Element you have to love it too. The Element is different for everyone. Whatever it may be for you, as Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” In medieval Europe, knights undertook quests to accomplish a goal that they valued. Quests involve journeys, adventures and risks. The quest for your Element is a two-way journey: an inward journey to explore the world within you and an outward journey to explore the world around you. Whether you fulfill your quest depends on how much you value the prize and whether you’re prepared to do what it takes to achieve it. You may be: To improve our schools, we have to humanize them and make education personal to every student and teacher in the system. Education is always about relationships. Great teachers are not just instructors and test administrators: they are mentors, coaches, motivators, and lifelong sources of inspiration to their students. The key to personalizing education is to invest properly in the professional development of educators. As Bill Gates argues, teachers need mentors too. Supporting educators to become the best they can be is one of the surest routes to improving the nation’s schools. In my view, we should then give them the creative freedom to innovate and do their jobs within a proper framework of public accountability.And I want to say a few words about what it is, about why it matters and what you can do about it if you feel you haven’t found yours yet. To be honest from the outset: “Finding Your Element” is not the book that will give you the answers. Nonetheless, no book can do that. There are many people on this planet, and each is a unique being with a unique set of talents - you included.

Finding Your Element Quotes by Ken Robinson - Goodreads Finding Your Element Quotes by Ken Robinson - Goodreads

I stumbled on to the books of Ken Robinson in the way that thousands of others probably have: through his wildly popular TED Talks. His easy-going speaking style and gentle sense of humor serve the topic of self-discovery particularly well. In Finding Your Element, you’ll find a writing style that closely matches what you may have seen while watching those videos. Robinson has a genuine interest in sharing the wisdom of self-knowledge that shines through. Understanding your own aptitudes is an essential part of finding your Element,” they write, because your Element is “where natural aptitude meets personal passion.” Sir Ken Robinson, PhD, is an internationally recognized leader in the development of creativity, innovation, and human potential. He advises governments, corporations, education systems, and some of the world's leading cultural organizations. The videos of his famous 2006 and 2010 talks to the prestigious TED Conference have been seen by an estimated 200 million people in over 150 countries. You probably have at least one of them, or maybe even more than a handful! You just need to open your eyes to discover them. You need to stay alert and think globally rather than locally. Because you can become a good bobsledder even if you’re living in Jamaica! How would you find that out if you’re not watching the Olympics and dancing to the beat of your heart? So appreciate how unique your life is, both socially and biologically. Your exact experience has never existed in human history, and it will not exist again. You were born with an entirely unique biological makeup, and entered into entirely unique social circumstances. This results in a life experience that can never be recreated.I think it was Phyllis Diller who said that we spend the first three years of a child's life teaching them to walk and to speak and the next twelve years at school telling them to sit down and shut up. We shouldn't be surprised if many of them find it difficult. Young children have great physical energy and a deep curiosity for the world around them." (p. 73) The assumption is: when the talent and passion overlap, then you are likely to have a successful, happy life with a sense of completeness. It is full of practical exercises and tips in finding what you are – and not - good at, what you love –and don’t like- to do, and discovering new opportunities to hone your talents and create your unique career paths in response to the needs of the environments. Decide which of your strengths really makes you feel happy. Be honest with yourself! For example, I have a friend who was a champion chess player, but she gave up playing chess to become a musician. Despite having a natural aptitude for both chess and music, music made her much happier! It is as simple as that!

Finding Your Element by Sir Ken Robinson | Waterstones Finding Your Element by Sir Ken Robinson | Waterstones

I agree with Robinson that passion is more important than talents because passion in many cases serves as intrinsic motivation in our pursuit - gives us a sense of purpose. We will gain sustained kinds of happiness, feeling spiritually complete, when we are doing things we feel passionately about. This is also due to the meanings that we create along the experiential process. All young people have unique talents and interests. In his moving poem, Malcolm London argues that education has to connect with the real lives of young people and not stifle their hopes and dreams. This is one of the themes of my own new book, Finding Your Element: How to Discover Your Talents and Passions and Transform Your Life. The worst thing that can happen is some people strike up a conversation with you before they’ve closed the door of the plane. And I mean, I’m happy to talk to people as we’re landing. There are those who say that we can’t afford to personalize education to every student. The fact is that we can’t afford not to. Watch the program and see what I mean. In 2010, Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, estimated that every two days we now create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003." (p. 7)

Are you in your Element? Do you love your life or the work you do? Sadly many people don’t have any great sense of purpose or fulfillment. They put up with what they do and wait for the weekend. Craig Kielburger]: "...I met with drug dealers who have greater faith in children to run drugs than I see people in the United States and Canada put in their own kids." (pp. 137-138) It’s never too late, never. Even if you’re 50 years old, you can start a new career. With all those courses and tutorials out there, how much time should you really need to acquire a new skill? A few months? A year? Maybe two? Though nothing extraordinary, “Finding Your Element” can be a useful book if you don’t let its suggestions be just a lone call in the wilderness. 12min Tip