Life is full of new learning experiences. We start learning from the day we are born, and it goes on and on until we die. But learning is what gives life meaning. Without it, we would just exist. I recently wrote about the Parenting of eagles, which detailed the basic beginning of learning in life.
As an infant, we learn that if we cry when we are hungry, we will hopefully be fed. The small lessons build as we get larger and older. We learn how to crawl, to stand, and then to walk. We listen to others around us as they speak, and we learn to make the sounds and form the words.
Then one day, we are thrust into another environment, school, where more structured learning happens. We learn to exist on our own, away from a parent or caregiver. We learn how to behave in a community of our peers. How to make friends and enemies. Making enemies may be the first negative behavior we learn, and we hopefully learn what we did wrong so we don’t make that mistake again. But mistakes are building blocks that we need to continue to grow.
Those structured twelve years expand to learning from books, videos, etc. The recounting of the experiences of people who have gone before us. We are exposed to history, geography, mathematical formulas, physics, other languages, and perhaps many other things about which we have no interest. Fortunately, in some schools, in the final years, we are given options from which to choose. When I was in school, many years ago, those included cooking and sewing for girls, and workshop-type classes for the boys. And the boys got a few weeks of cooking, while the girls also got some training in home repair type things like fixing broken lamps.
Along the way, in the late high school years, we began thinking we knew everything and counted the days toward graduation. I hate to tell you teenagers, who may be reading this, that the learning has just begun when you walk out of that school for the last time. The protective shelter is gone, and you will then be accountable for your own actions. And you will learn that you really don’t know everything. There is a whole unknown world now before you for you to learn from your own actions. Hopefully, without too many mistakes, if you are good at learning from them.
Lifelong Learning
With school behind you, and perhaps now being out of your parents’ home, your own life and survival are now on your shoulders. Yes, you can now make your own choices. Where are you going to live? How are you going to earn an income? Do you need training (ugh, more school) to get a good job, or at least a job that you enjoy doing? That earlier experience you learned, crying and being fed, will no longer work. You will now need to figure our how to feed yourself?
How can you buy that shiny new car in the dealer’s window? How do you ask for (apply) for the job? Do you have a car? Do you need insurance? Which insurance is best? Is the cheapest the best? Do you have a bank account? How do you write checks? Pay bills? Questions, questions, questions after you thought you had all the answers when you left school.
Life is always full of questions. And learning the answers is what makes your life meaningful. They never end, even when you grow old. There is always something new to learn. Something meaningful to add to your life. They are not always the tiresome things of just managing the day-to-day existence. There are wonderful new places to visit on a trip or vacation. Places and people to learn about. Things to enhance the enjoyment of your life.
Don’t be afraid of going back to school in later life. Community Colleges offer classes on so many things and you can just sign up for a single class on something like photography or computers or other everyday information needs.
What you want or need for yourself is your choice. Some of us want to see the world; others are completely content to just stay in one place that is comfortable for them. It’s your choice, but there will always be new challenges, new things to learn, just because aging changes us and changes what we are capable of.
The End of Learning
I said way at the beginning that learning never ends. I will be 91 in a few days. My life has been full. I have memories to fill books and books with, but the sad part of all the learning is that what has made my life so meaningful to me is just that. It was for me. No one wants to read about it. No one wants to learn from it. Even though they gave us history books in high school, we don’t really learn from others. It is every single experience that has been my learning curve. You have to make your own.
Please don’t ever stop learning. Please don’t think you are too old to learn something new.
“It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts,” per John Wooten.
Need a suggestion to get started? Check out the menu on this page and see some of the exciting adventures in learning that have filled my life.