Welcome back and happy new year. Hope you're enjoying the start of the year. Hope you're enjoying the start of the year. It's hard to think of a topic more important,

both through your own life and to the success of just society as a whole, then our ability to learn.

Learn from other people's mistakes, other people's successes,

how the world works, other people's biases, your own biases.

Like that's what makes the world great is that we can learn from one another.

Pretty obvious, right?

But what I've always found interesting is that there are so many different ways to learn and I feel like we don't talk about that enough.

And that's what I want to talk about on today's episode.

If I asked you, which do you think will lead to a healthier and happier relationship in life?

And arranged marriage by someone who doesn't even know you, or spending years meeting hundreds of people from different backgrounds and figuring out what you want and what you don't want, and then serendipitously meeting your partner only when both of you happen to be ready to settle down.

If those are the two choices, the answer for which is going to lead to more happiness and a healthier relationship is obvious, at least to me.

Now the first, the arranged marriage, you could call that active search.

It's managed on a timeline, it has rules, and it's done whether you are ready for it or not.

The second idea, let's call that passive search. You are in

control and you let it happen whenever it happens given what you want and where you are in life.

Now I think the same logic applies to what I've often thought of as active versus

passive learning. I would define it like this. Active learning is when

somebody tells you what to learn and how to learn it on a set schedule, on

pre-selected standardized topics.

Passive learning is very different.

In passive learning, you let your mind wander,

with no intended destination.

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