My brother lives surrounded by forest. He climbs trees. When I visit him I climb trees with him. We climb trees by approaching the tronc and finding the best way to climb it. Using this technique we can access most of the trees (depending on our climbing level, my brother can climb more trees than I do). But there are trees that cannot be climbed by their tronc. Too slippery, not enough grips to hold.
After climbing the same trees for a few months his level increased and his techniques developed and most importantly his vision on trees was evolving. Understanding trees, how they react to flexion, to humidity and much more.
He came back to the same tree he couldn’t climb at first and tried again with no success. The story could have stoped here. But instead he stepped back a few meters from the tree. He had a global view on it. He walked to the lowest branch that was still quit high relatively to human size and very thin. The lowest end was about 1 centimetre wide with a few leafs sticking out. By jumping a few times he managed to catch it. The branch bent a little. He grabbed more and more getting closer to the tronc, you could imagine, the branch was extremely bent. But he knew from prior trees that he could hang him self to it even if it seemed thin and fragile. He put his full weight and I thought the branch will brake from this kind of flexion but it didn’t. Slowly, he made his way up the branch and joined the tronc.
His vision together with the trees he can climb has evolved. A whole new world of trees that were previously categorized as unclimbable are now accessible.
By sticking long enough to a problem you will find a solution, one that is out of the box, away from the tronc.