Maintaining your mental flexibility – FineWoodworking

The fascinating part about woodworking is that it’s not something you can be good at overnight. It’s about the skills that you acquire through experience. The more experience you have, the better you are at pivoting when there is a mistake and, more importantly, taking from different aspects of woodworking to innovate your process. For example, dovetails: From cutting them by hand to using a table saw and routers, people from different backgrounds have come up with many different techniques for doing the same thing. Building that skill cache is what I call mental flexibility; there is no innovation in rigidly sticking to one technique. I’m not saying that the way things were constructed initially isn’t the right way. I know the Shakers perfected the candle stand, and I know many of those techniques from said candle stand can be transitioned into other projects. The understanding…