The second force is located at the other end of the spectrum from Awe. This second force is the prospect of Flow. We experience the exceptional and uplifting experience of Flow under conditions of challenge matched with sufficient support and capacity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). We can anticipate the experience of Flow if we know that we can be successfully challenged in navigating this whitewater environment. Our body is energized. Adrenaline kicks in and we experience fight (one of the three primary stress responses). We can do it!
Or can we? Is the river too strong for us? Do we lack the knowledge, experience, or strength to guide our boat through the swirling water and down the raging river? 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 (Sapolsky, 2004).
Appreciation: An alternative perspective can be taken regarding the turbulent river on which we soon might be afloat. 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 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. 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.
