Josh and his family needed urgent information, professional help and advice; and they did what we all do in the ‘top-down’ world– they turned to the experts.Lutz's cognitive learning process penny says, “in the course of one week everything I thought I knew about learning from an expert was turned on its head as doctor after doctor turned my son away not knowing how to treat the case. In desperation, I turned to the internet and stumbled across a couple of facebook groups run by cancer warriors and their caregivers.Lutz's cognitive learning process in just a few more weeks, josh had gained a ton of new ‘grandparents’ and I’d gained vital fellow travellers as we sought treatment options, shared information, celebrated triumphs and grieved our fallen comrades together.Lutz's cognitive learning process the world of learning, I realised, had changed, and I was in a circumstance where I instantly changed with it.”

Eventually, the castle family did also connect with a flexible oncologist who was prepared to listen to the advice of elderly patients and caregivers from all over the world in terms of treatment options, genetic testing, and yttrium 90 radiology.Lutz's cognitive learning process “in the paradigm of ‘expert oncologist’, our son would not have been accepted as a patient of an adult oncologist, nor would the advice of so-called strangers from across the world, delivered via social media ever have been considered,” says penny.Lutz's cognitive learning process

In the world of learning from the expert; we find one and then listen, process their information cognitively and take what we need to know. In the new world of learning, penny realised that we need a different skills-set.Lutz's cognitive learning process we need to be able to truly connect, stripped of our personal brands and other artifices. We can’t access the wealth of experience and information from a sufferer of an extremely rare cancer on the other side of the world if we can’t begin to share our own vulnerability.Lutz's cognitive learning process since, josh passed, penny, clad in batman t-shirts, has comfortably called this ‘living your weird’.

“if you think about all the people who inspire or motivate us, there is always something a bit weird about them,” she says.Lutz's cognitive learning process “but it’s that weird that allows for connection because when you show me your weird it does two things. The first, is that I might see a bit of my own weird in you; and the second, is that it gives me permission to show you more of my weird.Lutz's cognitive learning process we can connect and we can belong.”

This opens up the world in entirely different way to pretending there is nothing weird about being you so that you can fit in.Lutz's cognitive learning process one is a whole-hearted option, and the other can only be half-hearted at its best. Penny shares that before josh’s diagnosis, she was caught up in fitting into the coaching world.Lutz's cognitive learning process her perceptions of other coaches’ expectations shaped her choices in clothes and activities. At josh’s memorial service last year, none of the coaches she had looked up to were available to attend.Lutz's cognitive learning process penny says: “it wasn’t so much hurtful as a data point. What was I doing trying to emulate people who were too busy when it came to a friend’s true moment of need?Lutz's cognitive learning process it gave me permission to stop pretending I liked highbrow eastern philosophy or yoga or any of the other things I’d been trying to do to fit in.Lutz's cognitive learning process