Trouble with Wondering

Knowledge Quester (5.7)

Table of Contents

Dedication

Foreword

Introduction: Deep Soul Intelligence 1

Life of Abundance 1.1

Brilliance Underrated 1.2

A Label to Correct Mislabels 1.3

Profound Connections 1.4

Seasons of Ebb and Flow 1.5

Unfolding Your Strengths 1.6

Deep Soul Strength One: Bravely Independent 2

Stand as One 2.1

Defend Your Independence 2.2

Map Your Autonomy 2.3

Thrive with Constraints 2.4

Risk Growth 2.5

Courageous Idea-Sharing 2.6

Deep Soul Strength Two: Crave Authentic Understanding 3

The Silence of Shared Resonance 3.1

Living as a Paradox 3.2

Seeking a Champion 3.3

A Parent’s Support 3.4

Occasional Angels at Work 3.5

A Friend for a Deep Soul 3.6

Finding True Love 3.7

Deep Soul Strength Three: Meaning Seeker 4

Live Kinetically 4.1

Find What Fuels You 4.2

Ignite Your Spark 4.3

Your Fractal Shape 4.4

Make it Meaningful 4.5

Let Values Drive Meaning 4.6

Pinpoint Purpose 4.7

Deep Soul Strength Four: Knowledge Quester 5

Chasing Complexity 5.1

Landscape of Possibility 5.2

Multipotentialite Overlap 5.3

Surpassing Curiosity 5.4

Existing in Possibility 5.5

Unique Learning Journeys 5.6

Trouble with Wondering 5.7

In a Wall Street Journal article, University of California Berkeley professor and learning expert Dr. Alison Gopnik reported on a study that pioneered a new approach to measure creativity. In the study, developed in Israel at the Weizmann Institute of Science, people play a game based on the complex way wild animals forage for food. They move squares around a grid to “make shapes they consider ‘interesting and beautiful.’”¹

The study confirmed that creativity involves two distinct thought processes: possibility-seeking and solution-finding. In the science of creativity, we call these two thought processes divergent and convergent thinking. Divergent thinking is exploratory, visionary, ideational. Convergent thinking is synthesis and analysis, turning ideas into viable solutions based on goals and constraints.

Dr. Gopnik took it further. She collaborated with the Weizmann lab to study children as they played the foraging game. Their findings show that children spent more time than adults in the exploratory, divergent phase. Consequently, they produced more original shapes than the adults did. On the other hand, children were less adept at the convergent aspect of creative thinking. Classic research from the fields of education and creativity can help explain this phenomenon. One study of over 1,000 K-12 classrooms showed that more than 70 percent of class time was focused on convergent teacher-to-student direct instruction. The findings showed that “not even 1 percent of the instruction required some kind of open response involving reasoning or perhaps an opinion from students.”² Standardization mandates like the US Federal No Child Left Behind Act and the Common Core standards generate an increase in convergent teaching approaches. One study showed that “teachers’ most immediate response [to mandates] was to narrow the scope and quality of course content, and, in turn, distance students from more meaningful and active learning of that content.”³ It is interesting to note that this effect of standardization was shown to be especially potent in low-income settings. (Think back to Catherine and the church cheese.)

This is why wonder can get you in trouble. Wondering is imaginative, original, divergent thinking. It is a profound expansion of curiosity, a dimension of the knowledge-questing deep soul strength. Yet wonder leads to experimentation which mostly looks messy and contrary to “the directions.” Wonder also leads to solutions outside of established systems, solutions that can feel threatening to the status quo. As William Deresiewicz wrote in Excellent Sheep, “People don’t like it when you challenge the consensus, especially when it’s one that’s so pervasive that they do not even realize that it exists.”⁴ Wonder entices us to ask questions, potentially annoying people or shaking their sense of control. As we mature, wonder annoys the established consensus and can pose a serious threat to power structures. At work, you may follow your sense of wonder and track down problems people don’t want you to know are there.

-Deep Souls Speak, quotes from our study

Author and business expert David Burkus has shown that over time, groups of all types and sizes tend toward conformity.⁵ Like ground-cover roots that grow tangled and hearty in your garden, once convergent thinking gains a foothold in a culture it’s hard to loosen it to make way for the full range of creative thought. And here’s the rub for deep souls. They revel in the entire creative thinking process. In many cases they favor divergent thinking, practice it often, and are quite effective at it. But if they find themselves in unsupportive settings saturated with convergent thinking, deep souls feel less than whole. That’s why they have to find their own pathways—and if they can’t, they apply their divergent thinking in divergent ways. They get into trouble because they absolutely refuse to give up their divergent thinking. Instead, they either repress it and regret it later like I did, or they check out and apply themselves elsewhere. In the saddest of cases, they may carry on robotically but without an ignited spark—or worse.

There’s a solution. The powerhouse thinking team concept that I shared earlier can help us overcome the present limitations of our education systems and business structures. Deep soul types who have stubbornly guarded their right to divergent thinking can pair up with those who do well in convergence-dominated systems. Together they can pioneer a robust way of working to deal with the rapid changes that challenge organizations in the modern world.