Be like Leonardo

Leonardo da Vinci’s accomplishments are so extra-ordinary that it’s easy to put an unbridgeable gap between him and us. While it’s unlikely we’ll reach the same heights, the question remains:

What he can teach each of us about becoming a high potential?

Consider these five lessons learned

1. Cultivate your powers of observation

Nothing was commonplace to Leonardo. He sketched over 500 drawings of something as obvious as flowing water. He was willing to look deeply and not assume that he knew how something worked.

What has become so familiar to us that we no longer see it?

2. Be curious about everything

“How to describe the tongue of the woodpecker”?  We might not be very interested in this question, but Leonardo was. He liked to delve deeply into problems and find connections between seemingly unrelated things.

Where have we stopped being extremely curious? What connections are we not seeing?

3. Dare to be multi-dimensional

Leonardo was a painter, weapons designer, map builder, draftsman, hydraulic engineer, and inventor. He was also an early impresario, arranging coronations and royal weddings.

How might we develop more broadly? What other interests and talents might weexplore?

4. Innovation is not a solo sport

Leonardo saw the necessity of reaching out across disciplines. He went out of hisway to find collaborators, seeking out engineers, architects, artists andmathematicians to work on big projects.

It’s unlikely that we will study hydraulics, optics, architecture, and painting, butwhere can we stretch across our own professional boundaries? Whom might we beable to collaborate with?

5. Be a lifelong learner and never stop

When others might have retired, Leonardo left Italy for the first time, at age 64 to take on new projects for the King of France. A few years later, while trying to solve geometry problems, he died. 

Leonardo commented that throughout his life he had been a learner, as well as a teacher.

What are we learning…. and teaching?