Birds Don’t Need A ‘Flying for Dummies’ Book Either

The Hotpot | April 2025 | By Lisanne
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Ever seen a bird, freshly born and out of its nest, chirping alongside its hungry siblings, fighting over a worm—while its parents hand him a copy of Flying for Dummies?

No?

Me neither.

Birds don’t read handbooks before they spread their wings.

They don’t travel to every corner of the planet to find a guru for advice.

Instead, their mothers throw them out of their nest, just like that, and they learn to fly as they go. They crapple and fail, their wings clumsy at their sides, not quite sure how to use them yet.

Humans take a different approach. We collect advice like souvenirs.

We watch YouTube tutorials to figure out how to boil the perfect pasta. We buy pricey online courses from people who claim to make a fortune and promise riches if we just follow their steps.

When we tiptoe into a new industry, we try to find mentors, experts, or experts by experience to guide us the way on the still foggy path we are trying to walk.

Information is fine. Advice can help. But only if we know how to filter it.

Advice ultimately works when you know what to ignore. Much like a gold prospector walking along the beach with a device that tells him where to find the gold, the filter in our ear can help separate the signal from the noise.

We need the filter, because getting good at something requires something most gurus won’t tell you:

To stop buying courses, to stop fixing, filtering, or endlessly upgrading yourself. And instead, let’s go into the world to do the thing.

To test our waters, spread our wings, and train our muscles.

You don’t become a writer by reading about writing. You don’t become a filmmaker by studying films. Ultimately, success is in the doing.

Sometimes learning is just a sophisticated form of procrastination. A way to postpone the thing you should be doing. The nest won’t hold you forever. The world isn’t waiting for you to be ready.

Great results can come from making a decision based on what you know now. And confidence comes from knowing that whatever happens, you’ll be able to handle it.

And once we try, our wings will carry us farther than any guide ever could.

Start flying.

Thank you for reading. The journal prompt of today:

When was the last time you used the filter in your ear?

Let me know in the comments.