“I would like you to print everything the program does in a step-by-step format. This would make it easier to learn.”

Yes, it would be wonderful to be given linear, step-by-step directions for everything we must learn. When you’re given the answer, and not expected to wriggle for a while, new concepts, programs, and methodologies can be grasped with ease and comfort.

The reality, however, is that we aren’t living in comfortable times. If you want to stay up with the crazy, fast paced nature of technological progress, you have to be ready to tread in a sea where the waves are choppy, your arms are tired, and the water level is creeping dangerously high.

Fortunately, we become stronger in this tumultuous environment. We give up knowing, or even attempting to know, all the answers. Understanding that life is change helps us know that comfort is a thing of the past, and so is security–if security were even a reality at all.

And since change isn’t going anywhere, printed directions that delineate a program in a step-by-step fashion are useless, because once the directions are written, the program changes. Google and Apple don’t even attempt to write user manuals anymore. Information can be found piecemeal on the internet; this means the user won’t learn a product all at once. Instead, the user learns as he or she needs to learn. Necessity prompts knowledge–it’s the only possible way for progress to occur. The hypothetical directions that could arrive with innovations would actually be DOA because products change too quickly.

We can’t wait for everyone to be comfortable or “in the know.” When one thing is learned, we’re already behind on the next thing coming down the pike.