Lessons from My Father: Seeing Problems in 3D

Lessons from my father.

As a teenager, I recall once sharing a problem with my father – something to do with the way a teacher was going about teaching and testing one of my subjects.

Dad listened patiently to my complaint and then looked at me silently with a smile for what seemed an eternity.

“Give me that cube”, he said finally.

At that time, the Rubik’s Cube was at the height of its popularity, and like most households, we had about five of them floating around the house.

“Most people look at their problems in 2D … but the world is 3D.

Your problem is a cube, it’s not a square. If you don’t like the square you’re looking at, rotate the cube. There are five other squares you can look at.”

Most problems have six sides. Are you turning your problems around looking for the face that spells opportunity?