Ask the right questions

I recently joined an IT company as a biologist and I am now a 'domain expert'. I rather like that title! Most of my interactions here are with people who understand very little biology. While this makes my average understanding of biology seem like I am a pro, I am a complete novice in their field, that of Computer Science and IT! And this is what makes it such an interesting situation. They don't speak my language and I don't speak theirs. But we are forced to try and understand each other. Initially, I struggled to keep up with their jargon and I felt like I was a slow child to whom everything had to be repeated multiple times for me to even grasp a very basic sentence. But this was true for them too when they had to be explained biology concepts. They would forget what I had told them half an hour ago. We had now formed a bond of sympathy. They knew what I felt and I understood their trouble. This experience has taught me a great deal of things. First and foremost, I have learned to be patient. You cannot rush anyone into a new idea or concept. Different people will have different ways of forming an idea in their head. Some use previous instances and form connections. Others use analogies and similarities with simpler phenomena. Everyone needs time to build a network of associations around a new thought for it to become entrenched in their minds. Then the concept or idea has to be accepted by their subconscious. Once that is done will they truly begin to appreciate it. An important consideration is that our minds get conditioned to a particular pattern of ideas or a particular way of thinking. A greater part of engineering education is spent on conditioning students to 'think like engineers'. This makes it harder to remold a bit of it when a new kind of concept has to be fed to them, one like biology. The same goes for a biologist, for whom concepts need to be substantiated by real instances for them to be acceptable to their minds. I can speak about engineers and biologists now because I have had that experience. But this must be true for all different 'professions'. (I say professions but actually I believe this permeates in all aspects of our lives whether we like it or not.)
That said, it is not impossible that one kind of person understands another. Rather, it has to happen all the time. So what is it that can facilitate communication between people? That brings me to the second and most crucial thing I have come to believe in the recent past. The key to good communication and better understanding is to be able to ask the right questions and listen for finding the answer. I am someone who talks a lot. But so often I completely miss the point and keep digressing. I ramble on about irrelevant subjects and I lose out on what the other person can offer or teach me. To make matters worse, I get vexed at the other person for being a fool and not being able to tell me what I need to know! But truth be told, the need is often mine not theirs. So the loss is mine. And even if I have to explain something to someone, I have still failed if they don't get it. What I should be doing is to ask relevant and precise questions. This is much harder than I thought, because my mind is scattered everywhere when someone is telling me something new and I am not able to pinpoint which part it is that I don't understand. One idea is to draw a mind map. This means, first think of the outermost shell of the concept, the end purpose of it all. This gives you direction a boundary(essential for me as I deviate so easily!). This is followed by a stepwise chunks of how we can get to this outermost shell from the inside out. Here, the innermost chunk or the core is the only one that has no prior dependencies. So whenever I feel like I don't understand how I got here or i missed a step, this is the point I ask a question. Also, the question has to be asked using the simplest words and with complete honesty, not trying to show how much you already know.And when it is me who is doing the explaining, I need to find out what the other person has or has not understood. With this, I can explain to them better without confusing them and wasting time.
The third important thing I learned is that if you are to learn anything, first of all you need to let go of superficial agendas. You need to first convince yourself that you are trying to learn something so that you gain depth, and not to look or feel smart. The quest for understanding something should be driven by a question you want answered, a problem you want to solve. And the purpose should be clear to you.
As hard as this is to implement, it becomes easier over time as our mind is so agreeable to conditioning! So I have come to believe in the power of questions. All the worlds mysteries are just sitting around waiting to be understood. All you have to do is ask the right questions.

Colors

COLORS
Of blushing cheeks,
Of violet sky,
And magic dust on a butterfly,
Of rain washed petals,
Of muddy ponds,
And dewy dripping fern fronds
Of dripping honey,
Of sun burnt hands,
Of high tides on the sun drenched sands,
Of every color I can see,
I want a pinch to keep with me,
So if I ever were to forget,
If the world became gray and dead,
If for color my eyes were sore,
Ill open my box and live once more.

Spring

Hidden things
Peeking out
Green fingers
Grope about,
She is waking,
She is waking,
Breathing in
Breathing out,
Colored crown,
Atop her head,
Eyes wide open,
Slumber shed,
Sun-kissed cheeks,
Breath perfumed,
Minstrels sing,
Vividly plumed
Life returns
To her frozen toes,
Colours erupt,
Wherever she goes
How long she’ll stay,
Who can say?
For sleep will call
Her back one day.