Learning to learn optimally with Micro-VCoL Makers™
There are several ways to learn to micro-VCoL. One of these involves building your own micro-VCoLing practice with Lectica’s free Micro-VCoL Makers. This article will help you get started.
If you don’t yet know what a micro-VCoL is, here are a few articles you might find helpful: VCoL in action: How to use micro-VCoLs to learn optimally on the fly, Everyone should have the opportunity to develop optimally, VCoL in action: The many benefits of micro-VCoLing, VCoL in action: The active observer, Micro-VCoLing skills.
You’ll find a full explanation of the micro-VCoL learning practice in the article links above.
Micro-VCoLing is a little four-step learning practice—Set, Seek, Apply, & Reflect—that supports optimal learning and development by helping us make the most of every learning opportunity we encounter. ‘Set’ is setting a small skill-building goal—something that can be practiced on the fly—like noticing opportunities to ask clarifying questions. ‘Seek’ is spending a short time, usually about 10 minutes or so, learning more about your chosen skill (e.g., “What is a clarifying question?”), ‘Apply’ is practicing the skill in real time, and ‘Reflect’ is a nano-second reflection on how your practice went. There’s also a second reflect step that usually takes place after a few days of practice. You’ll see how it works later in this article.
Because few of us already have the skills required for effective micro-VCoLing, learning to micro-VCoL takes practice.
As you can see in the micro-VCoLing Skills Map below, there are a number of skills you’ll need to practice if you want to become a masterful micro-VColer. The map is organized around five skill sets—the four steps of the VCoLing process (set, seek, apply, and reflect) plus an additional skill set called “Goldilocks Zone detection.” All of these skill sets involve an active observer. I think of my active observer as a corner of my mind that I’ve trained to act as a highly disciplined observer and regulator. Despite my best efforts to avoid anthropomorphizing my active observer, it has set up residence on my shoulder right next to my left ear and looks a bit like a stern Tinkerbell.
The “Goldilocks Zone” is an American/English expression with deep European roots. It means, “the zone in which something is just right.” The term is used by astronomers to describe a planet that might foster life. We use it to mean, “when a task is just challenging enough to be fun.”
If you cultivate a disciplined and versatile active observer while practicing the other skills shown in the Micro-VCoLing Skills Map, you will gradually habituate micro-VCoLing. In other words, you will develop the habit of practicing the skills required for learning optimally from everyday experience. You will also establish a stronger connection between learning and your brain’s built-in motivational system, which will help you find the same joy in learning you experienced when you were baby learning to walk and talk.
How learning works
Our brains our designed to develop by making connections—both physiologically and logically. The video below shows what physiological learning looks like.
When you watched the video above, you probably noticed a few things:
- Learning involves making connections.
- There are locations (nodes) where many connections come together.
- Nodes grow and shrink as connections are created and pruned.
What you couldn’t see in the video is that when you are practicing a particular skill, it’s only being built in the part of the neural network that’s activated by a particular context or task. For example, if you begin the process of building awareness skills by practicing a micro-VCoL focused on “noticing when you become angry with your teenager,” the connections made in your brain are likely to be related primarily to noticing when you are angry with your teenager. If you then practice noticing another emotion in a different context, you will have skills for noticing two different emotions in two different contexts. In other words, you will have consciously contributed to the growth of your connectome.
At this point, you’ve built more skill around noticing emotions, but your ability to notice emotions has not yet been generalized. You’ll need to practice noticing a variety of emotions in a range of contexts before this happens. Moreover, the fact that you are able to notice emotions does not mean you are a noticing virtuoso. Before your active observer can reliably notice anything and everything you ask it to notice, you’ll also need to practice skills like noticing the emotions of others, noticing behaviors, noticing without judgment, noticing opportunities, and noticing skills.
Fortunately, the benefits of noticing begin to accrue on day 1 of your first noticing micro-VCoL, so you don’t have long to wait for positive effects.
You’ll know that you’ve generalized noticing when it begins to feel like an almost effortless element of everyday consciousness. This does not mean you will always notice everything. That would not be desirable. It just means that you can ask your active observer to selectively notice just about anything—with good results.
Why start with noticing skills?
Building noticing skills is the first micro-VCoLing skill to learn because it lays the foundation for all other micro-VCoLing skills. The more time you spend on noticing, the easier it will be to build subsequent micro-VCoLing skills.
In general, going slow at the beginning of building a new skill speeds up mental development by creating a strong foundation for subsequent learning.
Building micro-VCoLing Skills with the Micro-VCoL Maker
You can access the Micro-VCoL Maker from the link on its intro page. When you land on the Maker page, click on “Choose a Micro-VCoL Maker”, then click to view a list of Micro-VCoL Makers.
Micro-VCoL Makers are arranged by starting age and level. It’s best to use the Makers in order, because the skills targeted in each successive Maker build on the skills in the previous Maker. (The listed ages are the ages at which most people can begin befitting from conscious practice of these skills, not a diagnosis of mental ability.)
After you choose your Maker, the first thing you’ll see is a map of the specific skills targeted in the Maker. You can download this map for reference if you choose.
Right below the skill map, you’ll see a form that offers eight choices. These choices probably won’t make immediate sense, but after you’ve created a few micro-VCoLs, they will make perfect sense.
Chose something in every category, making sure that the situation you choose (third item) is both relevant for you and something you encounter fairly frequently. When you’re ready, click on “Make my VCoL”
Now you can scroll down to view your micro-VCoL. If you like the micro-VCoL you’ve created, and think you will have plenty of opportunities to practice the “apply” and “reflect now” steps, save it by downloading it.
After you have completed the “seek” step, it’s important to keep your micro-VCoL with you so you can double- and triple-check to ensure you’re practicing the apply and reflect steps as instructed. If it takes more than a few seconds to complete the “apply” and “reflect now” steps, you’re overdoing it.
We hope you enjoy learning to learn with the mighty micro-VCoL. If you’d like to share your experience with micro-VCoLing, please let us know by filling in our contact form.
Need more support?
If you’d like to optimize and track your personal developmental journey, subscribe to MindLog™, and watch yourself grow.
If you prefer learning in a group, check out ViP “VCoL in Practice.”
And finally, if you enjoy working with a coach, check out our list of Certified Lectical Practitioners.
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