Or can we? Is the river too strong for us? Is the Surf too high? Do we lack the knowledge, experience, or strength to guide our boat through the swirling water and down the raging river? Will we be swallowed up in the mountainous waves? Fear sets in. Adrenaline is now energizing one of the other two stress responses. We want to run away or remain frozen. We are apprehensive. We are torn between the urge to fight, flight, or freeze.
Appreciation
An alternative perspective can be taken regarding the turbulent Interlude. We can breathe in the oxygenated air that accompanies turbulent water. We can savor the richly textured sounds of the tumbling water. We become satiated with the Awe rather than remaining fearful of the Awe-fulness. We can follow the flow of the river or the flow of the waves and envision finding Flow inside us while navigating the river or high-surf ocean. We can view this as an opportunity to learn rather than as a potential failure. This is a teachable moment if we dwell on the positive prospects rather than the negative possibilities.
This decision point regarding appreciation versus apprehension seems to be aligned with what Peter Vaill (1996, p. 75) identifies as “feeling learning”:
“Feeling-learning is one of the most important modes of learning as a way of being because the pace, pressure, and complexity of permanent white water can leave us distracted, anxious, and breathless. Millions of us go through years of intensive learning in the institutional learning mode without ever getting much help in feeling and internalizing what we are learning and what we know.”
Vaill (1996, p. 75) does not believe that traditional institutions of higher learning provide this type of learning:
“The institutional learning model tends to omit all the deeper modes of learning and knowing and the help we need with these, not because the philosophy of institutional learning denies the existence of the deeper modes so much as it lacks methods for conducting learning at this level. Learning as a way of being is learning by a whole person, and that means feeling the learning as well as possessing it intellectually.”
Feeling-learning is one of the most important factors in retaining what is learned in the Turbulent Interlude. Maybe the reason information we “cram” is retained only for a short period is that we do not develop our feelings for the material but try only to remember it on a technical level. Feeling learning also enormously enriches the learning experience. Even institutional learning expresses this in one of its favorite cliches, the “love of learning.” The love of learning is real. And it is essential. It would seem that converting apprehension to appreciation, savoring Awe, and anticipating Flow are moments of feeling-learning. We don’t even have to launch our kayak or hop on our surfboard to begin the process of learning. At the moment we decide to engage the turbulent environment of the river or ocean, important lessons are available regarding our courage, resilience, and potential risk-aversion.
There is additional learning. Peter Vaill mentions several kinds of learning occurring in the whitewater world. In setting the frame for presenting these forms of learning, I turn to the fundamental insights regarding learning offered by Jean Piaget, the noted Swiss biologist and observant child psychologist. Piaget (2001) distinguishes between the assimilating and accommodating dimensions of all significant learning.
Assimilation
Piaget proposed two sides to every coin of significant learning. One side of the coin is Assimilation. As a learner, I must have an existing frame of reference for any new experience. Without this frame, I will not be able to make any meaning of the new experience or will label it and absorb it inaccurately. The other side of the coin is Accommodation. I must somehow adjust what I now know or believe, given the new experience. If nothing changes, then nothing is learned.
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