202508112241 Try to have a beginner’s mind

#wip #new

Sometimes we need to come at a situation from a fresh perspective and disregard our conventional wisdom or contextual information in order make progress. This is commonly referred to as “taking a step back” or “working from first principles”. Another way of putting this is to “try to have a beginner’s mind” about it.¹ What would a beginner think or ask about this? What would I do if I didn’t have all of this conventional wisdom or normative bias? What do the fundamentals tell me about this situation? What does the data say?

It can be hard to have a beginner’s mind (202406201458 I've lost the knowledge of how I learned what I know), but making the effort to disregard assumptions can be valuable.