I’ve been experiencing this incredible synchronicity around this very idea lately. I’ve had a half dozen conversations about the dangers of being too single threaded in the past 2 weeks. The “Where there’s smoke” podcast just put out an episode on curiosity. This is definitely something that is resonating with a lot of people.

I’m of a mind to know how everything works. I want to know about bee keeping and traffic planning and foreign cultures and the making of plastics. And what I consistently find is that something you learn about making bread makes you better able to answer a question about politics or know how to do carpentry.

Experts are necessary and incredibly valuable, but for most of us, being single threaded makes us boring and unwilling/unable to get into the mindset of someone else. I firmly believe that a lot of the toxicity in our politics and culture comes from the inability to admit that one’s opinion might not be fully informed or that another person could rationally arrive at a different conclusion. The more that I explore and discover, the more I recognize everything that I don’t know and the more willing I am to listen to others.