You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

Growing up, it was common for my father to use familiar figures of speech to express life lessons.  “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks” was one of those. As the good son in this scene, I accepted this at face value and carried this wisdom around with me as truth.  

Agile Best Self Principle 2 says “Approach change with curiosity, even late in the game”.  The comma conveniently separates this principle into two important ideas within the principle.  Approaching change with curiosity is something Michaele talks about a lot in how she addresses problems or challenges.  I like that thought also, and it starts with mindfulness.

The science around mindfulness (or meditation, if you like) is in its infancy, but the evidence of the benefits of it is building.  In this 2011 study, the Canadian and German scientists in their conclusion of the impact of mindfulness practices improved present-state awareness, state that their research “..demonstrate that for individuals with long-term practice of meditation, mindfulness induces a pattern of brain activity associated with acceptance of emotional stimuli and reduced interference from internal states, possibly reflecting enhanced present-moment awareness.”

My mindfulness practice has built the skill of seeing my thoughts from the outside looking in, which creates space to look at thoughts with curiosity and enabling new and potentially more beneficial responses.

Agile Best Self Principle #2: Welcome change with curiosity.

Morning Meditation

The second part of Principle 2 (“even late in the game”) was something that gave me a little more trouble.  I subscribed to my father’s wisdom, felt that my lot in life had already been mostly cast through genetics, with limited ability to make any real, profound change.  This changed the day I met Dr. Michael Gervais in May of 2017.  In his talk that day, he argued that it is possible to train the brain, just like we train our body or our craft.

That day he showed up with a long list of scientific arguments for neuroplasticity.  Neuroplasticity is term that describes the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life.  It also starts with mindfulness, as the core skill to learn. I think about doing daily mindfulness, just like I think about working out at the gym.  If I can build these new neural connections up, maybe I really can learn to do new things. This thought definitely changed me going forward and helped me understand better what it meant to be an Agile leader.

So, maybe the old wisdom is not really true. I guess you could say you can teach an old dog new tricks!

Copyright © 2018 – 2026 Michaele Gardner and Brian Hackerson

What is Best Self?

One of the things I like about working with frameworks, such as Scrum, is it gives us a common language from which to share and advance ideas. Without a shared understanding of terminology, our interactions can get muddy very quickly.

My personal philosophy “Be a Light”

With that in mind, I was reflecting on our experiences sharing the 12 Agile Best Self Principles at the Global Scrum Gathering this week, and with some new faces entering our community led me to define what “Best Self” means so we can build great interactions as we pursue ways to be our best selves.

To get the ball rolling, let’s look at the words independently. I went to Google and asked for definitions. As an adjective, best is defined as “of the most excellent, effective or most desirable type or quality”. The term is used to describe the quality of something relative to others. Self is a noun that is defined as “a person’s essential being that distinguishes them from others, especially considered as the object of introspection or reflexive action”. I like to think of the personal philosophy as a good definition of me (self). For me, it is to be a light. I strive to use that to decode all of the information that buzzes around me, and the best version of me shows up when I intentionally be a light in each encounter in the day.

Then it makes sense that our best self is our unique, essential being that is the most excellent, effective or desirable.

What’s missing is the element of time, I think. We do not or cannot show up as our very best all of the time. Maybe you’re sick? Maybe you are tired or stressed? Some days, our best self is to just show up. Or maybe our best self today is to focus on rest and recovery so that our best self can show up when it is needed.

What is your personal philosophy? Does it describe your best self?

Copyright © 2018 – 2026 Michaele Gardner and Brian Hackerson