Expose Yourself to as Much as Possible

I recently read an research article saying “children that do chores become more confident”

• https://www.whiteheadlearninggroup.com/news/2021/8/19/why-kids-who-do-chores-are-more-successful-according-to-studies
• https://www.happykidswin.com/post/chores-for-kids-and-a-growth-mindset

This really resonated with me, my first connection was not to my own childhood. But rather my years in the student life, where I have seen the value of exposing yourself and doing tasks one usually would not have done.

My childhood

Lets take a step back to kids. I do not have kids, but I have been a kid. Yes I did chores every week and joined my father in all the practical work he did. I also spent my years in primary school building lego, tinkering with electronics, building flame throwers, making movies, spreading viruses, hosting servers, pirating, video editing, building tree houses and doing all kinds of things. I could spend hours solving “tiny” problems and learning how to do tasks that I today view as simple. All of these hours made me very confident in my abilities to solve problems and building things and I’m pretty sure it is because I started so early.

Let’s say you joined your family to build a deck in the garden. As an adult you suddenly know the basics of how to build a deck and you feel more confident in you abilities to do any kind of practical work.

Preparing dinner for the family is another example where you learn the basics of cooking, cleaning and doing basic things.

I spoke in front of large audiences at primary school, at the church and other settings, and today I am quite confident in speaking in front of large audiences. By practicing speaking you will get better to deliver your message in a way that is understandable and engaging. And it will be easier for you to speak in front of people.

Translated to student life

One of my favorite student life examples is NHH - Norges Handels Høyskole where people are almost forced to join student organizations to have a social life. By joining they also end up being in the board and get practical experience to board work, economy management, project management, event planning and other stuff (which is exactly what they educate them self to do in the future). So when a NHH student is asked later in life to join a board, they can say “Yes I was board member and was responsible for the economics of the student organizations at school, I know how to do this.”

Another example is the technical student organization; fribyte.no. Here I have seen how giving people responsibilities and ownership of tasks, makes them accelerate their learning and become much more confident in their abilities. Suddenly they take on bigger tasks and start leading other people. In a short year they go from knowing nothing to hosting their own servers, managing their own projects and teaching other people.

My general impression is that every kind of experience is good. All the hours you spent on solving problems, doing chores, speaking in front of people, working in teams will make you more capable and confident in solving future problems. You will have a broader perspective and be able to see the problem from different angles. This will make you more confident in your decisions and you will be able to make better decisions based on past experience.

Examples

Some examples of how to expose yourself to as much as possible:

Final words

Expose yourself to as much as possible, all experiences, good or bad, will be good knowledge for future decisions. Start as early as possible and you will already be years ahead of others.