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The kitchen is starting to resemble a kitchen again, to the point that we are even able to have food in the fridge and freezer and are planning on cooking something on the stove tonight. Nothing fancy - literally boiling some corn on the cob. Not even fresh corn on the cob (it is rarely available in Finland), but the vacuum sealed version. Still - it is something!

It is looking good though and while there is nothing yet in the drawers, it feels like it is going to be functional once we start organizing it properly. This takes time to learn new habits and hopefully, we can get it right at the start.


![image.png](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/tarazkp/23z7SbifZtaAwjgFyjeAhnhsGskwjGZ4vHyu8GoEbbkbYzXEQEiHQqT8qQuXG7FQswk9T.png)

It reminds me of all the stuff we bought and organized in preparation for Smallsteps to be born, where we had her room set up with a changing table and all of the things we thought we would need carefully organized. But, a few hours after she was born, she was rushed to the ICU and stayed there for just under two weeks before being able to come home. 

However, if there was a positive from this, it was that the nurses in the ICU had a huge amount of experience dealing with babies (obviously) and they had a similar changing area as us, except theirs was set up based on their massive amount of experience, whereas we had none. So, as we were also using their set-up, once I realized it was far more functional, I changed ours as best I could to match, which meant that from then on, every nappy change (and all the other things we had to do) was more efficient. 

This is the power of *role modelling* experience, which is similar to learning from other people's mistakes, except it is on the other side of the coin, learning from other people's successes. Too often I think that this is a lesson that we overlook and depreciate, which is probably in part to us not liking to compare our own "failures" to the successes of others. Instead, we look at *their way* of becoming successful as *unsuitable* for us, as if they have some extra ability we do not possess. 

It could be true of course, but without investigating it thoroughly, we do not know. Dismissing their approach early, means not being able to even try doing what they did, which is something that I have become familiar with on Hive over the many years, where the "secret to success" is no secret at all - it is just work. The type of work is going to be dependent on the person, but from the content creator viewpoint, it really is about consistency in engagement, content creation and emotional reaction, with *stability* being the key, not instability. 

I believe that those who have built their presence here this way have tended to do pretty well and once they have the core habits in place, they continue to grow and develop their own paths, adding their own unique personality and processes into their habits - *owning their content and experience.*

Role modelling isn't about copying forever, it isn't about tracing and mapping what others do for eternity, it isn't about becoming robotic, quite the opposite. It is about learning the basic best practices and then adding artistic license over the top, much like learning scales and chords well, can then be used to build entirely new musical experiences. Or learning brush and color mixing techniques can lead to painting masterpieces. 

Yet, it also isn't about having to take it that far either, because in the areas that we might not be that interested in, like the layout of a kitchen or a changing table, we are able to copy what has already been learned and get better results than we would have got just randomly doing it on our own, without the interest to *do it well.* If we are interested in getting better results, but not interested enough to go through the trial and error phases, copying  what others do is probably our best bet.  

It is like all of those DIY videos on YouTube that we watch to not really learn how to do something, but copy what someone else has already learned. We don't intend to be experts, we just intend to get a good result for a specific one-off task. Trying to be a professional at everything is a losing game and, being stubborn and trying to learn everything from scratch, heavily limits how much we can learn and, often will have to be on things that we don't really care about the process of anyway, just the result. 

>But, I tend to be stubborn.

I enjoy the trial and error experience, because even though I might not get the best results, I value the feeling of *my results.* But, I am also careful to counter this with whether the results are worth it and, what kind of impacts bad results will have. If the cost of failure is too high, I will copy others, but if it is a low-grade cost to fail, I will give it a shot. This way, I get to learn stuff, get the sense of accomplishment and, the feeling that what I have created is more mine than if I had just copy and pasted it all from someone else. There is plenty of failure, but the level is acceptable. 

I think learning is often a case of "picking battles" and if we are able to find a balance of copy and trial and error, we can improve our overall results and, spend more time developing in the areas that we are truly passionate about, and their associated supportive skillsets. This way, we become more efficient and effective and therefore, have more resources to improve in the next iteration, or next field of interest too. 

But you don't have to believe me - *try it yourself.* 

Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]


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