Learners Unlimited
(for 1989 Learners Unlimited Gathering)

by David Boulton 

I provisionally believe that there is an orientation towards life that is as profound as it is practical - as maximally relevant as it is minimally presumptuous, by this I mean a learning orientation (1).  I aspire to learn to be learning oriented.

Towards being learning oriented I aspire to learn to co-create a team. A team that reflects each member's personal vision, evolving personal challenge - and each member's talents, competencies, and realistic availability. A team whose leaderless leadership emerges from dialogue and by this I mean a pervasive learning orientation towards one another that challenges (2) us to learn to share meaning, to learn to share energy - to learn to be co-present.

I propose that the provisional concentral intention of this team is to learn to create (and be) environments (3) which invite (2) and challenge (2) all participants - (starting with ourselves) to be learning oriented. Proceeding from such an intention, I propose we learn to extend it into specific subject /thematic domains, continually broadening our own learning environment while developing a body of understanding which we can learn to "export" through a variety of "products"(4) most importantly ourselves and our participants

I propose that an enterprise evolve to develop and propagate these products. An enterprise whose central reason for being is the people for whom it provides a major life environment. It's central foundational assumption: that people can learn to enliven one another in ways that bring out an excellence, creativity and collaborativity capable of connecting relevantly, productively, inspirationally and profitably (5) with the world. If we can learn to do this we will be of service in the emerging world of learners. If we can't we need to learn why for we will have mapped in relief the challenge of our times.

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1) Cultural evolution is beginning to select "learners". In the face of rising complexity and rapid change, we are realizing that learning is the key to developing human resources in organizations and health and well being in individuals: business is learning that the "business of business is learning." The reason is simple,practical and compelling: yesterday's knowledge doesn't consider today's contingencies whereas learning today can include but is not limited to yesterday's knowledge; the common denominator among virtually all social change movements is learning. The central message of the ecology movement is "Learn about your role in the environment"; the human potential movement : "not only do you learn, you are learned - learn about yourself". The growing awareness of learning's meta-implicate significance is redefining the person of the future. Whereas the past has needed and produced "knowers" the future will need and call forth "learners". The primary characteristic of a learner is the ongoing process of learning to be learning oriented.

2) explicitly and implicitly, creatively and relevantly, compassionately and practically, bio-energetically, physically, emotionally, intellectually and intuitively - wholly.

3) Metadigmatic learning-oriented relationships that act as contextual gymnasiums for our capacities for learning (3a) by calling us to be proprioceptive of our own inner meaning movements as the most generally relevant and creatively spacious way of engaging ourselves in a "subject". 3a) The capacities to learn : First the human being's natural inner sensitivities and attention dynamics; second, learned critical thinking/reasoning skills and knowledge interface. In the former there are issues ranging from attention span and distraction thresholds to the inner intentions and sensitivities required to actively participate in learning. Sensitivities including desire, curiosity, uncertainty, etc., that act as the self-referential ground for the subsequently ordered employment of learned skills.  Within learned skills there are general critical reasoning skills, general knowledge interface, and the subject specific principles of critical thinking and discipline-specific knowledge interface. Without inner sensitivities for grounding and engaging the learned skills, the learned skills can mechanistically insulate people from themselves (tacit automation). Without developing critical faculties, our inner sensitivities do not extend far enough out into the world of abstraction to drive the learning process through areas of practical necessity.

4) Curriculua, pedagogies, specific threshold experiences, contents, facilitation models, technologies, etc...  

5) organizationally self- sustaining and nourishing economic feedback