refuse to choose

Barbara Sher, in Refuse to Choose! defines Scanners and divides them into a variety of subtypes (pointing out that most Scanners are more than one subtypes).

There are two broad types of Scanners: Cyclical and Sequential. Cyclical Scanners return over and over again to a large variety of different interests. Sequential Scanners also have lots of interests, but when they are done with something, they are generally done for good.

I am mostly a Cyclical Scanner, although I’m more Sequential on the big things like professions—I’m done being a computer programmer and an entrepreneur. But I’ll probably try novel-writing again just like I picked up knitting this week for the third time in my life.

Of the Cyclical Scanner subtypes, I most associate myself with the Sybil. I sometimes wish I were 20 people; I can easily list all the projects I’d love to work on if I were 20 people; most of those projects represent long-term interests; I have a major clutter problem (although I’m hoping that some of the techniques I’m learning in Refuse to Choose! will help reduce that as I move into the new house).

I luckily stumbled upon one of the ideal careers for a Cyclical Scanner—Librarian!

One of my favorite suggestions in Barbara Sher’s Refuse to Choose is to have a collection 20-30 half-inch three-ring binder. Each binder is devoted to one interest. If I had been doing this the last time that I was interested in knitting, I’d have a notebook full of patterns to choose from instead of starting from scratch. This is a low-impact, low-commitment way to explore a lot of different interests at the same time.

I love the idea, but I’m doing a variation. Since much of the research that I do on a new interest is on-line, I thought that it would be more useful to have a virtual three-ring binder. So, I’m making wikis for each topic at www.pbwiki.com.

Barbara Sher’s first practical advice in Refuse to Choose is to keep a Scanner Daybook. The plan is to write out your ideas. I’ve actually been doing this for awhile, to some degree, as a response to one of Richard Bach’s books. He introduced the concept of the Idea Fairy and said that you should honor each idea, at least by writing it down, or the Idea Fairy will stop giving them to you.

But Sher carries the notion much further. Scanners benefit from playing with ideas on paper, to as much detail as possible, because playing on paper is satisfying, revs our brains, and doesn’t require a commitment.

I bought Barbara Sher’s newest book—Refuse to Choose! It’s all about the kind of people she called Scanners in one of her earlier books. Scanners are people who find so much interesting in the world that we sometimes get stuck being unable to choose, or we start things we don’t finish because new interesting things come along, or we learn how to do something well and then never do it again because learning was the interesting part.

I figure us 43Ters are a bunch of Scanners, so it might be fun to share any thoughts while reading the book.