A tree with deep and multiple roots has sweeter fruit

and is better able to withstand

pressures of the environment

YOU MUST LEARN BY TEACHING

Balance to Prosper underscores the value of learning by teaching live a subject you're passionate about, even if you're not an expert. Setting a plan and a firm ​deadline to share your knowledge with your community is a commitment that will drive you to better yourself. Learning a subject to teach it to an audience ​will push you to succeed and stay focused on your path of excellence.

Balance to Prosper is more than just an idea; it’s a vibrant community of practice that thrives on genuine online interaction. It's about presenting your ​authentic self with confidence and drive and fostering a sense of connection with your audience.

Step 1. You can use your existing Facebook or LinkedIn account but befriend only people you trust.

Step 2. Go to the Google Meet website: https://meet.google.com/landing Create a meeting and copy the link.

Step 3. Create a teaching session, approximate the price you want to charge, and announce your session to your community. Post the Google Meet link with a ​link to your preferred payment method to your favorite charity, such as Venmo.

Step 4. Teach your lesson and split the cost of the lesson by number of participants.

Step 5. Remind your community that payment is entirely optional.

RULE #1 Respect for contractual obligations. The information that you are obliged to keep secret is sacred. That is the virtue of doing BTP on a ​topic outside of your expertise. Nevertheless, it must be emphasized that there is no breaking NDAs and confidentiality agreements.

RULE #2 Copyright and intellectual property rights. Copyrighted material cannot be shared without the author’s permission. Intellectual ​property rights must be respected.

RULE #3 Give proper credit. The goal is not to ignore the experts but to learn from them. When you do so, give them credit, advertise them ​and spread the word through your community where you have gained the knowledge from.

BTP method uses established internet systems and capitalizes on their terms of use, which I wholeheartedly encourage you to accept and ​respect. Remember, we're here to support each other, and that includes no hate speech, pornography, etc. (For full Google Meet terms see: ​https://support.google.com/meet/answer/9847091?hl=en)

Technology has enabled unprecedented connectivity between human beings across large distances. This has enabled people to ​develop their skills by learning from the best in the field. Despite tremendous progress across disciplines, this connectivity has ​also caused enormous inequality because learning from ordinary people is often judged as sacrificing quality. The core tenet of ​Balance to Prosper is that quality and expertise are not 0 or 1, and various quality measures can coexist. While learning guitar ​from a music expert is valuable, who can say that Jimmy Hendrix and Django Reinhard are irrelevant? Django Reinhard was self-​taught and played guitar with three fingers, yet he produced some of the most memorable standards.

Quality metrics in sciences may be more objectively defined, but who can argue that a microbiologist can not benefit from ​teaching geology or painting to the community? Learning by teaching will take their understanding to the next level by gaining ​new insights and fostering collaboration.

Today, we can watch professional sportsmen and celebrities compete and perform on TV. Still, we largely neglect local athletes and artists, who ​are not nearly compensated as well as professionals. There is an extreme focus on becoming a G.O.A.T.; if you don’t know the acronym, it ​means Greatest of All Time. Often, this effort focuses on being a master in a narrow discipline. This may be a lap swim, instrument playing, being ​an expert in some scientific or social field, or collecting trophies. Core tenet of Balance to Prosper is that G.O.A.T. metrics are arbitrary. Aspiring ​to be a G.O.A.T. may mean sacrificing authenticity. Be yourself, build yourself and learn by teaching something that is NOT your area of ​expertise.

In today’s world, there is little focus on developing multidimensionality and well-roundedness. I believe that’s because being a G.O.A.T. ​is correlated with becoming rich and happy. I contend that many aspiring G.O.A.T.s are more often very poor and unhappy. This ​stereotype of a G.O.A.T. as rich and happy stems from the fact that we only see the successful ones. The core tenet of Balance to ​Prosper is that curiosity can only be cultivated in a world where venturing out of your comfort zone is valuable. Allowing yourself to ​breathe means freely diversifying your knowledge base and enriching your community by teaching them something you may not ​neccesarily be authority on. Again, quality is not 0 or 1 and various measures of quality can coexist.

Research has shown that without doubt when you learn something with the intention to teach in later, you learn it more deeply. That ​said, Balance to Prosper is not a philosophical concept, it’s a practical initiative that shows others how to leverage existing internet ​platforms to learn by teaching in their community.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/prot%C3%A9g%C3%A9-effect-why-teaching-someone-else-best-way-learn-simmons/

Say, I want to learn crochet. To do that today, I would open up a YouTube channel ​and learn it from a crochet master. I would perhaps learn it from my 80-year-old ​grandma in the old times because there was no internet back then. Learning from ​the crochet master has given us unprecedented quality of service with many crochet ​styles. However, by doing this, I also ignore my grandma.

With BTP we can take advantage of various expertise and benefit local talent. To do ​that, we must lower the entry barriers for grandma and other versatile individuals to ​the marketplace. You may say, grandma can record a YouTube video and gather ​views and eventually make money from advertisements, already. The problem with ​that is: human ingenuity is so great, to the extent that we have corrupted all the ​automated ‘review’ systems. Can you really trust reviews and ‘number of views’ on ​any website anymore, including Amazon? There has to be a better way.

While learning from experts in the field presents many advantages, it also ​incentivizes the experts and you to focus only on mastering a narrow discipline. This ​may occur to the extent that people neglect their health and well-being. Being well-​rounded means incorporating an exercise regimen that enables success.

The obvious pitfall of learning from experts only is that you spend all your money on ​one or a few investments. For example, if you only have $200 to spend, you may ​invest it all in becoming knowledgeable about some extremely specialized skill. You ​can also stretch your dollar by learning from a local teacher about adjacent or ​remote skills. This will benefit and add character to your skills, too. If you own a ​specialized business and people’s interest in your product decreases, you may pursue ​another venue to support yourself. This is the exact reason for being balanced. ​Balance to Prosper means being versatile in today’s marketplace. While it is true that ​there are dangers of over-diversification, only you can be a judge of how much to ​enrich your arsenal of skills with another discipline.

A principle in toxicology states: dose determines the ​poison. This dictum was all too well exemplified by a ​person who died from drinking too much water. In the ​same vein, becoming an over-specialized expert can be a ​liability if interest in your skill diminishes. Balance to ​Prosper encourages its members to diversify their ​portfolio of skills in a way that is meaningful to them. This ​way they develop authenticity and character that ​differentiates them from the crowd of aspiring G.O.A.T.s

Balance to Prosper Workflow

The Figure on the right shows one possible workflow for BTP classroom.

It may be argued that without a geology expert in the room, a microbiologist may teach any content to the ​audience, correct or not. First, it must be recognized that a microbiologist with his science background does not ​have zero expertise in geology. Secondly, any teaching relationship involves two elements:

• Trust
  
• Expertise
  

Without trust, any teaching/life experience is likely to be compromised. Accredited diplomas do NOT guarantee ​trust, as we can see from many examples of experts abusing their customers (doctors overprescribing opioids, ​etc.). Rarely do we have an expert in the room to guarantee correct teaching, anyway, so invalidating the BTP ​teaching format is not a fair assessment.

I think people should learn only from someone they can trust but quality and expertise are not 0 or 1 quantitites ​and diplomas do not guarantee trust. BTP is done through your community; if there are trust issues there, thats a ​larger problem that must be addressed through different avenues.

Another concurrent phenomenon is that experts have gained such a deep knowledge of their field that they cannot communicate with those ​outside it. On an ideological level, many of us live in a bubble and rely on experts who confirm our biases, leading to polarization of opinion ​and conflict. Many people think within their narrow frame of reference to the extent that even though we speak the same language, we think ​of different things while using the exact same words.

The aim of Balance to Prosper is not a state of uniformity of thought and opinion where ​all our differences are erased. BTP is done through your community. The goal is to foster ​introspection that enables the detection of blind spots in our minds. Struggling to ​pinpoint one’s deficiencies of thought can only happen when you know you will face a ​critical audience. You strive to learn and analyze every source of information only before ​the test. That is when learning and making connections happen. That is when true ​research happens, too, because correct experiments are done only when you have a ​valid hypothesis.

Differences between people will always be there, and thats good. How else can we ​recognize one another? Without differences, humanity can be reduced to a can of ​identical and dispensable worms. The value of a original insight and unique perspective ​can only be realized in a society where we are different. That’s why its important to learn ​and broaden our perspectives about different elements of our society and language that ​we use to describe it. The best way to learn is to teach.

Would you like to join Balance to Prosper? If so, organize a BTP in your community of friends and colleagues. Get energized and learn by ​teaching them something you have always been passionate about.

If you have suggestions and would like to contribute to the organization, contact me below, please.

balancetoprosper@gmail.com