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When Learning Feels Frustrating

Even though I urge others to learn something new, I’d avoided doing it myself.

Posted April 27, 2021 | See this article on Psychology Today |

KEY POINTS

  • As an executive coach, I ask businesspeople to try new leadership approaches that are hard to take on. I had to do the same.
  • When you tackle something uncomfortable, it can lead to frustration, and later to aha moments.
  • Pushing your brain and thinking in new ways can lead to despair, or eventually to exhilaration.

I am one of the coaches for my university’s Executive Masters of Business program.

We encourage our executives to stretch, try new leadership muscles, and tackle skills that may be uncomfortable or difficult to achieve. This past year, especially this past month, I’ve asked myself to do exactly that. It’s not a pretty picture.

For years, I’ve written non-fiction for work. I’ve wanted to write fiction and have tried on and off with no success. It felt like lying and I’m a terrible liar. I gave up.

When the pandemic started, though, I decided to try again. I signed up for an online class in writing a novel. Last year, staying home, I had more time and decided to let loose. Within four months I had drafted a 75,000-word novel I call “the worst novel in the world.” I did that to remove any pressure to “perform,” or set expectations about what this would be. It was exhilarating.

I sent it off to some friends and an editor and began working on novel number #2. This seemed like a breeze. Again, finished in another four or five months and asked a few good readers to give me feedback.

As the feedback found its way to me, I found my way to despair. The feedback was consistent, which was good, I think, but touched on some areas I was at a loss as to what to do – “going deeper in the characters, making them three dimensional, turning them into people that readers will care about, point of view.” What? I have to do more with this package I thought was “finished?” I wrestled with the manuscripts, changed from third to first-person point of view, tried to build in more emotion but still came up short.

Then I took another online course. This one offers a whole new vocabulary, way of thinking, and method of preparing a story. I’m lost, I’m struggling, I feel like I’m hearing Chinese or Arabic, not English. I’m dog paddling and staying in the same place. But, I’m trusting the process. I’m doing the work. I’ve made micro-steps but can see the major ones ahead of me, and probably there are more than a few.

The process has been painful, I sometimes rail at the instructor, at the materials, at my brain for not “getting it right.” And then, I stopped and laughed at myself. As teachers, as coaches, as parents, that is what we ask of others, why shouldn’t we ask ourselves to do the same?

And sure enough, I had a breakthrough two weeks ago. All of a sudden, the language and ideas make (more) sense. I’ve not had that “aha feeling” in a while, and darn, it feels good. Here’s to trying something new more often.

About the Author

Nancy Napier

Nancy K. Napier, Ph.D., is a Distinguished Professor Emerita at Boise State University, Executive MBA professor of strategy and leadership.