Learn to love the learner’s mindset – in art and in life
“What do you want for dinner tonight babe?”
My girlfriend stared at the screen in front of her and shrugged. “Dunno, whatever you feel like cooking.”
I pulled out my phone.
Pinterest has been my cookbook for the past year or so. At least three nights a week I open the app and scroll through the endless thumbnails of dinner ideas and recipes. I usually opt for a noodle or rice dish, or maybe a salad… something relatively easy and unpretentious. Preferably low in cholesterol – because of genetics, okay?
But golly-gee, all these developments on the tariff front really had me yearning for a meal that would “bring it home,” so to speak (because we haven’t heard enough verb-the-noun slogans here in Canada over the past couple years).
Tariffs were one thing… not enough to get me to the supermarket on a quest to cook Canadian cuisine, and certainly not enough to have me checking the labels on every item in my cart to ensure I wasn’t buying anything American-made.
But it didn’t stop at tariffs.
Threats of annexation… threats of war, threats of crushing our economy and strongarming us into becoming the 51st state… that pissed me off.
That really….pissed me off.
So, I decided on poutine for dinner.
What other dish could I have picked, really?
Hawaiian pizza, maybe.
I could have made California rolls, I guess.
Those were both “invented” by Canadians. Although I wasn’t fond of cooking any food named after an American state… and also, Hawaiian pizza and California rolls kind of suck.
At the time that I’m writing this, the homemade fries are soaking and the gravy has yet to be mixed – so the verdict on my poutine is still out. I can’t yet comment on whether or not the gravy and cheese curd smothered fries agreed with us, or whether, elbows up, our digestive tracts (and cholesterol levels) are about to take a hit for team Canada.
But dammit! I had to do something! I couldn’t sit idly by and not enact some form of patriotism.
Hence, the poutine.
I’m open to poutine. I’m certainly not anti-poutine. Who am I to dismiss a beloved, and absurdly high in cholesterol, Canadian dish?
I’ll cook it! I’ll try anything once.
I really do enjoy trying new things. That’s an openness that didn’t always come naturally to me. I owe my openness to my passion for the arts.
To develop as an artist, to build and hone your skillset, to expand the breadth of your technical and artistic aptitude, you really need to be open to a learner’s mindset. You need to be open to trying new things.
I picked up photography, out of nowhere, having never before expressed interest in it. I practiced, I learned, and I practiced some more.
And then I learned to draw. I took lessons during the pandemic. I practiced, I learned, and I practiced some more.
I then set my sights on 3d modeling. I learned dozens of industry-standard 3D applications, I took courses. I studied whenever I could – after work, on weekends, staying up late, straining my eyes in front of my computer screen, studying into the early hours of morning.
I practiced, I learned, and I practiced some more.
Now I’m taking that same formula and developing a skillset around digital compositing in film and content creation.
Practice,
Learn,
Practice some more.
That’s the formula. It applies to art. It applies to cooking. It applies to every aspect of life.
When you adopt a learner’s mindset, growth and development are expected.
Maybe my poutine sucks. Maybe the fries are soggy and the gravy is bland. Maybe the cheese curds don’t melt properly and it all kind of makes my stomach turn.
If so, I’ll try it again.
I’ll practice, learn and practice more.
A learner’s mindset, graphically speaking, is an upward sloping line. The kind of upward sloping line that would make every Jack Welch – inspired CEO go green with envy.
In these unfamiliar times, as Canadians, we’re going to be faced with many opportunities to learn, to develop and to build meaningful, resilient and unified communities that can stand in the face of intimidation.
It might take some practice. And we might need to embrace an openness to adapt, and to change as the world around us also changes.
On that note, I don’t necessarily mind checking all the labels at the supermarket.
I see it as good practice.
**Post-Poutine verdict = not bad… not bad at all. 7/10
