Boundaries - Friends or Foes?

Think of something. Or give yourself 2 minutes to think.

Stop. Now answer this question:
What would you rather do, let a train hit five people tied to the tracks or switch the tracks so that only one person gets hit?

                                                                                            

Ok just forget about thinking. Do something, anything.

Stop. Now do what I tell you: take a box of LEGOs and build a tower at least 10 centimeters high, containing more red blocks than any other color blocks, and the tower should have at least one helicopter landing spot, two stairs that lead to the top and 3 or more floors altogether.

                                                                                            

What's the point of all this?

If I ask you to think of something, anything at all, than you have a huge amount of freedom in your thinking. Yet you progress much more when I tell you to think about something very specific - in that case you immediately start thinking and you are fully involved and immersed in that specific question.

In this case if you think enough on the railroad question, you might enhance your thinking, learn something new, progress to new interesting territories while encountering challenging parts in the thinking process, maybe think of some wildly new idea that can influence the way you or others live!

If you have to build a LEGO tower, you start building and you encounter obstacles that you MUST overcome with your creativity and unorthodox thinking.

When I tell you to just do something, or just think of something, you would have probably done or started to think about something simple or just very random stuff or just about nothing at all.

By giving you no boundaries, it's hard (although not impossible) for you to do anything outstanding.

By giving you the right amount of boundaries, you can achieve amazing things.

However giving too many boundaries leaves you trapped.

Having the proper amount and types of boundaries that push us has key importance in our development and learning. It's very hard to give other people or ourselves the correct boundaries - this is one of the most important tasks of teachers and trainers.

Physics analogy: In flowing water, the less space you give it to flow the faster it flows!

Where else are boundaries a propelling factor instead of a bounding factor?