LEARN FOR LIFE
I was clued in to this post on "life-long learning" via Lifehacker.
After dropping out of college, I promised myself that even if I never went back, I would at least continue to, uh, learn stuff. Over all, I suppose it's gone pretty well. I've certainly never had the money or time to take formal training in anything, and yet I do know more than I started out knowing, which means that I must have learned.
Still, I find self-training a pain in the ass; yes, it's worth it in most cases, but the memory of how tough it is makes it difficult to start educating myself on any new subject. Usually, I learn a little bit, then quit. Fortunately, that's probably okay. Check out this passaged (under the heading, "You don't need to master everything." Whew!)
Yes, there is hope for folks like me -- or not. While it's not important to become an expert on everything, it would be nice to be an expert on something. Even the lower standard of being "[...] able to converse intelligently [...]" is beyond my grasp. If that's the phrase I'm looking for.
I'm slipping into a spiral of doubting my own knowledge! Who am I? Where's my dinner?!
After dropping out of college, I promised myself that even if I never went back, I would at least continue to, uh, learn stuff. Over all, I suppose it's gone pretty well. I've certainly never had the money or time to take formal training in anything, and yet I do know more than I started out knowing, which means that I must have learned.
Still, I find self-training a pain in the ass; yes, it's worth it in most cases, but the memory of how tough it is makes it difficult to start educating myself on any new subject. Usually, I learn a little bit, then quit. Fortunately, that's probably okay. Check out this passaged (under the heading, "You don't need to master everything." Whew!)
I think the act of learning is usually what's important. Sure there are things you may need to learn for your job, or whatever, but don't feel like you need to become an expert at everything you pick up. For example, I'm reading a book (see, mixing it up) on Ruby On Rails. I'm learning a lot but I've got no intentions of becoming a Ruby programmer or RoR developer. My goal is to learn enough to be able to converse intelligently about it, but that's about it.
Yes, there is hope for folks like me -- or not. While it's not important to become an expert on everything, it would be nice to be an expert on something. Even the lower standard of being "[...] able to converse intelligently [...]" is beyond my grasp. If that's the phrase I'm looking for.
I'm slipping into a spiral of doubting my own knowledge! Who am I? Where's my dinner?!
