What’s your style of learning? – Yang of knowledge and Eum of wisdom

Image from www.wisewomencanada.com
Image from wisewomencanada.com

Do you know your style of learning? Better yet, what style of learning do you apply for solving problems and meeting challenges, be it professional or personal?

Applying the principles of harmony meditation I have come to a better understanding what my styles are and that in learning, just as in any other area of life, there are Eum and Yang (yin and yang) approaches to it.

For example, someone who excels in sciences may be struggling with humanities or languages. When I was in school, languages were taught mostly by brute repetition, and for a person with a Yang style of learning this won’t work as well as for a person with an Eum style of learning. One learns better by hearing, the other – by visualization, and these two functions are related to Eum and Yang.

Knowing yourself and your style of learning will save lots of hardship and disappointment. In some cases we need to apply the Yang style – think sharply and solve the problems quickly. More challenging problems require the Eum approach – thinking deeply for a prolonged period of time, getting immersed in the problem and having patience to endure the pressure.

Practice of meditation helps tremendously with the latter, especially for someone with a developed Yang style of learning. The Eum style may not bring fruits right away, but they are much sweeter and tastier.

When we grow patience and love towards ourselves, when we develop the ability to endure and observe our own thoughts and emotions, good or bad, new insights and wisdom emerges.

Most of all, proper practice of meditation should bring about tremendous benefits not only in stress release and personal well-being, but in learning and adopting valuable attitudes of consistent effort, openness, continuous improvement.

The question is – what is it I want to improve the most in your life? To me, the answer is clear. “Who am I?” is the only lifelong endeavor worthy of researching, developing, and sharing the fruits of with others.

Cherchez la femme, and a man

A battle of the sexes goes on not only in the outside world, but is an intrinsic part of our everyday living and being. Unless you, the reader, came from planets other than Earth, Mars, or Venus.

Science is finding hard evidence of the differences between male and female brains, as described in this article from livescience. They found a major distinction in how various parts of the most vital organ connect in young brains of male and female participants of the study.

How Men's Brains Are Wired Differently Than Women's
How Men’s Brains Are Wired Differently Than Women’s

My teacher Johwa Choi delved deep into the principle of Eum and Yang in TaeGeukDo training for human completion. The female and male characters are referred to as Eum and Yang, respectively. These concepts are much more general and encompassing than our limited notions of female and male, and are not meant to discriminate or suppress any part of the whole.

Emotions are more like female energy Eum, while thinking, mental energy represents Yang. This system constantly regenerates itself – thoughts generate emotions, emotions serve as a backdrop of thoughts. The landscape is changing dramatically or not changing at all depending on a director’s temperament and his or her ability to refresh the scene.

At times it feels like the system is having a life of its own, and the only way to be free of it is to pass out or go to sleep. Have you ever felt that way? I sure have. In meditation, a common practice it to let the thoughts flow, which in my understanding is solving the yang problem with the eum treatment, being non-judgmental and observing calmly. What should we do about emotions then? It depends. They are much harder to recognize than thoughts. They, too, can be further categorized as positively (yang) or negatively (eum) charged.

My job requires me to use a lot of yang energy, mental energy. It is easy to get engrossed in it, especially when I have to deliver on tight deadlines. After a while I lose awareness of my body – sloppy posture, shallow breathing, clouded judgment. I start feeling tension, tiredness, fatigue, lack of energy, and work becomes a burden. My body is sending me the signals; my Eum is saying – don’t forget me, I am here. It urges me to take care of it. I go to a private room and do some stretching, deep breathing, meditation for about 15 minutes. I feel entirely refreshed and ready to take on the next challenges. This is the power of Eum and Yang’s harmonious symbiosis, the heterosexual romance of the mind and body.

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