**Date: [[2022-02-17]]** **What is the big idea?** A disorienting dilemma, such as a major life change or a new experience, opens the door to development of new [[Mental Model]] or [[cognitive frames]] that fundamentally expand or change our view of our place in the world and how we and the world work. > > Transformative learning is the expansion of consciousness through the transformation of basic worldview and specific capacities of the self; transformative learning is facilitated through consciously directed processes such as appreciatively accessing and receiving the symbolic contents of the unconscious and critically analyzing underlying premises. > > Perspective transformation, leading to transformative learning, occurs infrequently. Jack Mezirow believes that it usually results from a "disorienting dilemma" which is triggered by a life crisis or major life transition—although it may also result from an accumulation of transformations in meaning schemes over a period of time. Less dramatic predicaments, such as those created by a teacher for pedagogical effect, also promote transformation.An important part of transformative learning is for individuals to change their frames of reference by critically reflecting on their assumptions and beliefs and consciously making and implementing plans that bring about new ways of defining their worlds. This process is fundamentally rational and analytical. > > [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformative%20learning) _"This process is fundamentally rational and analytical" from wikipedia._ Do I believe in that? Why is that so? Can't this be an (at least partially) emotional trigger? **What does this remind me of?** This reminds me of [[Perspectival knowing]], and how does that perspective of your lens through which you observe the world changes through [[cognitive reframing]], generally by [[Mentoring]] and supportive [[Inquiry]] of your [[cognitive frames]] and [[cognitive biases]]. What is the way transformative learning works for the other ways of knowing? - [[Procedural knowing]]: How can you have a transformative experience that helps you know how to do something in a step-fashion? Unsure - [[Propositional Knowing]]: How can you have a transformative experience that helps you understand certain facts? Unsure. - [[Participatory knowing]]: How can you have a transformative experience that changes the way you interact with with world? I think this is a good place for transformative experiences. A near-death experience may cause you to see your time on earth as limited so your interactions move from infinite to finite, causing a new way of deciding how to evaluate your use of your time or expertise. **When have I come across this lately?** When I was on vacation in California, I found that by running every morning, I was able to tolerate the slow pace of an unplanned vacation without a "need to achieve." Maybe this shifted my thinking about vacation, relaxation, and opened a new way to seeing the world of "days off." **What would the opposite argument be?** What is the relationship between [[learning curves]], and [[forgetting curves]] to transformative learning? Are these both broken models? What metaphors do we use? - Learning curves represent gradual changes in how we think or do. It is like the "one percent better" idea of slow accumulation of change. - For example "wearing the path a little deeper" - Transformative learning is a "step change" as opposed to a gradual change. - For example "Installing updated software" _Since we don't understand the fundamental ways human cognition works, we can only use metaphors here._ What other metaphors would be helpful? - Non-transformative learning is like heating an object through pressure, then the object cools when the pressure is released - Transformative learning is like a nuclear reaction - Hydrogen to helium through hot fusion on the sun, the helium cannot turn back into hydrogen - ... **Sources:** [[Mezirow Transformative Learning, Theory Into Practice]] https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/327-transformative-experiences