Imagine being able to cope with everything the mountain throws at you. All types of terrain, all types of snow conditions, all types of weather and all types of hazards. Not an easy task, or is it? Phil Smith from Snoworks Ski Courses explains “going divergent”.
Does This Statement Sound Familiar To You?
“Yesterday everything seemed to be going really well, and today I just can’t get it together.”
If so, then it’s time to look at the way you ski and learn the sport because what you’re really saying is, “Yesterday I was so lucky, the snow, the weather and the terrain matched my skiing perfectly – but today I was so unlucky, everywhere I skied the terrain, the weather the snow did not match my skiing.”
So how can you get back from skiing every day and say, “Wow, what a day”? The answer is to go “divergent” in your learning, your attitude and your skiing.
Divergent Learning And Skiing – Creating Solutions
Divergent learning starts with a single problem, and out of the single problem we create multiple solutions. You keep going with solution after solution until you can’t think of any more. You exhaust all possibilities. Great problem solvers are divergent thinkers. Great businessmen are divergent thinkers. You need multiple solutions to every problem. Then you can narrow down the solutions to the most appropriate, the most desirable, the most suitable. Divergent skiing is where you are free to constantly change how you ski and to adapt to the ever-changing conditions. To have no set “style”, no particular “way of skiing”, just be free to move and adapt and change to suit the ever-changing mountain environment.
Great skiers are all “divergent skiers”. They have learnt divergent, have a divergent attitude and ski divergently. You can see this in all the free skiers and top racers. They know how to create solutions on the move, instantaneously. Not thinking they are doing something the right way or the wrong way, they find a way to create a solution. To get down, change direction instantaneously, go faster or slower at will whatever the terrain, whatever the conditions.
On our courses we have many skiers that say things like, “Last year my instructor told me x, y or z.” My answer is always the same: “What slope were you on, what was the snow like and what was your objective at the time?”
We have skiers that constantly say to us, “I need to improve my technique”. As though there is a technique they are looking for, a way of doing something that will work everywhere. They are looking for a single solution to multiple problems rather than looking for multiple solutions to each single problem.
Great skiers don’t look to improve their “technique”, they look for solutions to problems. How to grip more on ice, how to push heavy snow sideways to control speed off-piste, how to slow down quickly, change direction suddenly, manoeuvre through a narrow space or an awkward bit of terrain.
Conventional Teaching – Convergent Or Divergent?
To begin to go divergent it’s a good idea to look at how you learnt and think whether it was convergent or divergent. Were you looking for single solutions? Were you taught one technique? Do you have a particular way of skiing? Do you ski with your feet together all the time, stand tall all the time, ski low all the time or have your feet apart all the time? If any of these statements ring true then you learnt convergent. That means sometimes it will work, sometimes it won’t. You will have good days and bad days.
To cope with everything and finish the day where every day is a good day, the only way is to go divergent.
Divergent sports people do things differently and unexpectedly. They lead the way, they don’t follow; they create their own style, they don’t copy. They find many solutions to each problem. As Hannibal said in response to his generals who said it was impossible to cross the Alps with elephants, “We will either find a way or make a way.”
Divergent learning, thinking, skiing and developing a divergent attitude don’t happen overnight if you’ve learnt convergent. It will take some time. There is no one way of doing things, no one technique, no one style. So to begin with, if you are used to looking for set answers, it may seem a bit vague, a bit open-ended. But it’s exciting, ever-evolving, ever-changing, and that in itself is so exciting. A mistake isn’t a mistake, it’s an opportunity to learn.
Phil Smith is founder of Snoworks All-Mountain Ski Courses. Snoworks runs All-Terrain Ski Courses throughout the year where you can learn divergent skiing to become a competent all-mountain skier. www.snoworks.com
