Why is Learning So Hard?

If you came here looking for wisdom, you will probably be disappointed. It seems like I have spent my entire life in some purgatory of forced learning, and I have not yet learned to love the learning process.

Frequently when I attempt to actually do something, I run into the universal brick wall. I cannot do what I want, because I don’t know how or I don’t got the stuff. In spite of my frequent, and always disappointing encounters with the brick wall, I have very little wisdom to offer, only a collection of my favorite excuses and complaints. You might think I would have learned better by now, but, as I will explain, I don’t wanna.

When I hit the brick wall while attempting to actually do something, my response is almost always some version of “I don’t wanna…” I am sophisticated enough to know that “I don’t wanna” is a solid excuse for toddlers, not for adults. So, I dress up my excuses with good reasons.

“I don’t wanna because I would have to read the instructions to learn how. ” Who has the time for that? Yeah, really, I have much more important things to do than reading instructions. Even worse, I gotta find the instructions on the net and the instructions never answer my specific question. So I will just pound on the “Next” key, even though it is grayed out. Maybe it will respond after 1,000 attempts?

“I don’t wanna because I am a DIY kinna guy.” I am a maker. I don’t do what people, or websites, tell me to do. I make things, and I make things happen. I just DIY. At this point, the nagging little voice in my head pipes up to say, “So, how is that working for you right now?” My response usually is, “Not so well, now shut up.”

“I don’t wanna because you need a piece of paper.” Often I get stuck because, in order to complete task X, I need to get a piece of paper (approval, authorization, release, certificate) from organization Y. As an example, we recently relocated to Texas from California. The pieces of paper required raised adminstrivia to a new level. Of course the need for every piece of paper made sense; it just got to be tiring. This problem may be more doing rather than learning, but still it counts.

“OMG, I really don’t wanna learn this because I don’t even know enough to learn this. I gotta learn the prequesites. Yikes!” So now this project has devolved into learning some deeper fundamentals. This is definitely not progress.

“I don’t wanna because I don’t got …. knowledge, money, interest, time, or desire.” This excuse pretty much covers everything the first three excuses missed. Somehow, I am always a little short of knowledge, money, interest, time, or desire. So this is the universal excuse. No adapter needed.

These are very good excuses. If the world was fair and just, these excuses would give me a free pass to get beyond the lack of knowledge, time, money, interest, and desire, to go directly into the promised land of everything I want, but don’t wanna spend the time, money, interest, and desire to actually get for myself. So far, I have not gotten the free pass. Maybe next time.

This was a very good whine. I feel better now. Thank you for reading.