Development Ever Continues = A Constructive Alternative to the Model of Breakthroughs.
Hi Marcus,
Exactly my point.
Thank you for your discernment — and for your useful framing.
Interactive input is most helpful — thank you 🤗🙏🏼🤗.
And yes, your well expressed comment leads me to add that we might be much more ‘self generous.’ We can take the opportunity to congratulate ourselves for all manners of forward progress which we take for granted. Every instance of new thinking and behavior can be deemed a ‘breakthrough!’
Perhaps, what I haven’t yet emphasized — what your comment encourages me now to clarify — is that, as you point to, a ‘breakthrough’ is almost invariably a result of a period of development; a momentarily interpreted culmination in a continuing process seeded much earlier, which also carries on well after the ‘breakthrough’.
That developmental period includes yearning for expansion, determined application, playing and experimenting, trial and error, successes and failures, undiscerned learnings, contributions from others, putting things together for ourselves, etc.
The first time a person touches a new ability or embraces a new awareness may feel glorious and cataclysmic. However seldom does this dramatic, revolutionizing experience immediately become her/his norm and ‘go to strategy’.
A time of consolidation and reenforcement almost invariably both precedes and follows a 'breakthrough'.
If I think my ‘breakthrough’ comes out of nowhere, or means I’ll never face the related issues ever again, I may be ‘blindsided’.
Remember that while our language emphasizes words like “moment” and “arrival”, time never stops; which is to say time is always moving, as are we all.
Just as a newly discovered “phenom” has been working and developing for years away from public scrutiny (Tiger Woods was tutored in golf from age 3), 'breakthroughs' — especially ones which usher in new and sustainable levels of functioning — have been brewing over time, sometimes for years.
They are the result of incremental steps which may neither gain recognition nor receive acknowledgement.
What I think vital also to point out is that we as human beings are always growing — or at least intending to expand. Thinking in terms of 'breakthroughs' can provide respite and a model for feeling fulfilled by having moved forward. Still, leaving aside the idea that some people’s understanding of ‘breakthroughs’ can be fundamentally misleading and inaccurate (not as advanced as yours obviously is), the ‘breakthrough model’ can also unconsciously misdirect and dishearten by discouraging people from emphasizing and concentrating on the quotidian steps which make them possible.
Also important: a ‘breakthrough’ is at once a culmination to celebrate, and a new foundation from which to spring forward.
Everything is process.
Since thinking in terms of ‘breakthroughs’ enjoys such wide acceptance without rigorous examination, I think it useful to contribute perspective.
Hence, my article, which I thank you for contributing to and expanding.
With Love,
Jonathan : )
