I'm An Alien From Planet Right Brain

I was at work in the break room last week and I was knitting on my gloves and a coworker asked what I was making. I told her and she said she can crochet, but knitting never applealed to her. We discussed that, and how I used to feel the same until I tried it, etc... Then another co-worker, male, said something about it, can't remember, which prompted me to say: "It is a "right brained" activity. It stimulates the right side of your brain, whereas most everyday tasks are left-brained." There was a moment of silence, and I sensed that someone was going to ask the ''college'' question, but they didn't.
It is fun to just blurt out something "off the wall" like that, 'off the wall' to most people that is.

Just mentioning a word or topic that isn't an everyday, mundane routine idea, instantly confuses people. Most of society are Left Brained thinkers. The left side of their brain dominates. Right Brained thinkers have a dominant Right side of the brain, and are often said to "think outside of the box." Anyway, I found some interesting articles about the subject of left brain vs. right brain. I'm still doing reasearch and trying to find more info about it. It is so fascinating, and further explains why all the brainwashing about Drs., medicine, and schools works on most people. The first article tells about Albert Einstein and a few other people who were "Right Brained", and who were mistakenly labeled as LD because of their learning styles.
The second article explains some interesting things about the brain itself and how it works.
A third article discusses learning styles and differences between how right brains and left brains function in day to day tasks.
It is interesting how Jonas Salk had to function in school. He had to study and figure out all the work and lessons in a way that he understood it, NOT how the school taught it. Then he filled in the answers and worksheet to the "teacher's specifications." So it looked like he was learning the way the teachers taught, but he wasn't. He learned to play the school game, so to speak. Anyway this hit home with me, I had and still have a hard time understanding the WAY teachers and text books teach. Especially MATH. I've spent some time lately working with Jordan on her math books, and I keep getting enraged because the books don't explain WHY you do this or that. It just shows examples, but you don't know where a number came from in the first place, which paralyzes my brain. So, I've had to do a bunch of reasearch online and figure out how and why things are, then I have to go back and help her ''show her work'', backwards from how we actually came up with the answer, the way the book wants you to. It has nothing to do with finding the answer for me! So we play the game, because if you don't 'show your work' in the space provided, you get the problem marked wrong, even if you have the correct answer!! All they care about is forcing you to jump through the hoop, instead of being satisfied that you are able to discover the correct answers. And using a calculator is totally acceptable in my opinion also, if you 'know how'' to find an answer to a problem it shouldn't matter how you do it. Finding the answer is all that matters.
The article on Einstein said this same thing about him and math. He labored over trying to show his work, becuase he didn't understand it the way the books taught. He found the answer, or just 'knew' the answer but went bonkers trying to show the process of how to arrive at the answer in the manner the books taught it. He was expelled as a hopeless case, totally Learning Disabled in the teacher's opinion.
I'm not saying I'm a genuis or anything, just because I can totally identify with this exact frustration....
I'm sure that P is a left brain, and dad too. That is why everytime you ask one of them to explain anything to you, or they are trying to ask you something, they ask or tell it in a way that seems backwards to me. P is always doing this! When I proofread his written documents for work sometimes, I find that he spends most of the time trying to explain WHY this is the way it is, before telling what it is that he's talking about! So you feel dizzy like you are meandering along a crazy path and have no idea where it is going, as he never has stated what the main point is yet! It is quite entertaining at times.

For example, he called me recently while on his way to a small town in Northern Indiana to do a PP presentation. He first asked this: "Where is that map of Indiana you had out a few weeks ago?" I said I didn't know, as I was running through the house searching for it. He said "You just had it out, it was on the island in the kitchen. Don't you use it all the time? Did you put it back in your car? Is it in the drawer...?", growing impatient. "I don't remember", I said as I frantically searched and racked my brain to think of when it was I had supposedly had it on the counter and why. Finally I said "Why do you need that map?", thinking he may have had some notes or particular markings on it, or directions or a phone number written on it somewhere.
He said "I need to know how far so-and-so town is before you get to Warsaw."
Instead of just asking me what he REALLY wanted to know, he starts with asking me a question that was totally irrelevent to the situation. He begins with the mechanics of sending me on a safari to locate the map, instead of getting to the real point and just letting me decide how I would look it up! haha I'd been online when he called in the first place, so I could have easily just looked it up on Mapquest which is what I ended up doing anyway!

In one of the above articles, Barbara Pytel said: "Breaking things down into little chunks where you can not see the big picture drives right brains nuts." Exactly!!

Anyway it is all about accepting that there is more than one 'right' (no pun intended) way to do things. Everyone is programmed to believe there is only one way to do things, the way the school does it, or the way some 'expert' has developed.
If I can see a way to the answer or end of a situation, I don't understand why one needs to jump through a bunch of bothersome, boring, time-wasting hoops to arrive there, just to prove to someone else that you arrived there in an accepted manner. Like getting a diploma, just to prove to someone you have jumped through all the hoops. Most people are pretty good at jumping through the hoops, but in the end that's about all they can do. It is much more fulfilling and entertaining to figure out a way around the hoop jumping yourself, while at the same time devising a way to accomodate others to make them THINK they are jumping through all the right hoops, since they can't function unless they've jumped through and are assured that you have also!
Does that make any sense? It will to everyone living on Planet Right Brain!