My Thoughts on Being Teachable, adapted from Bob Gass

Twelve bees were placed in a jar in a darkened room.  A light was beamed onto the bottom of the jar, and then the lid removed. Instinctively, the bees flew towards the light and couldn’t escape.  So they died trying to buzz their way through the bottom of the jar.  Next the researchers took twelve common houseflies and repeated the experiment.  Within seconds the flies had found their way out of the jar.  Now, bees are more intelligent than flies and their survival instincts are better.  Yet it was those very instincts that doomed the bees.  

 Picture Credit, my friend and mentor John C. Maxwell 

There is a lesson here.  You may be very intelligent, yet your preconceived notions can doom you to failure in life.  Assumptions, rigidity, and force of habit can cause you to keep doing things that don’t work and make no sense.  

Dr. James Dobson says: “Until 1992 I wrote books with pencils and yellow pads.  I did that for years after word processors were available.  The twentieth century was almost over before I decided to join it.”  

Are you afraid to abandon an old belief system, or learn a new skill, or tackle a new project?  When you are finished learning, you are finished!  

The only real limitations are those we place on ourselves by refusing to learn.  “Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a just man, and he will increase in learning” (Proverbs 9:9).  

Don’t let your fears and preconceived ideas keep you from growing; be teachable.