Aurora @ Island Dreaming
We had a good collection of very elderly non-fiction books in our home library when I was growing up, mostly gleaned for pennies from charity shops and library sales. Some were encyclopedias, some were old school text books, some were beautifully bound introductions aimed at the 'working man'. My favourite was a learning library comprising of five leather bound books dating from the 1940s. If you worked through all six books, you would have acquired a good working knowledge of six different languages, maths, chemistry, physics, biology, political theory, world history, geography, economics, literature, drama, art and several branches of engineering. Each section had a fairly distinguished bibliography in the event you needed to learn more. There is no modern equivalent of this work and I doubt that there ever will be again.
Our choices are often presented as either/or when it comes to learning. You can be a good all rounder but excel at nothing, or you can be a world expert with no interests or real knowledge outside of your chosen field. Some people are written off at school age alltogether, as if they are inherently incapable of learning. Polymaths are a rare thing these days and in popular culture anyone who uses their spare time to study a subject in depth or even passionately pursue a hobby is regarded as something of an eccentric. Since I embarked on a more frugal sustainable lifestyle, I have had to learn many new skills. I can now do more for myself than perhaps even I realise; and I have had great fun experimenting. But I have no real indepth expertise in anything; and I am beginning to feel dissatisfied.
Expertise is useful. I have no interest in becoming a master baker, but it is handy to have an expert to consult when my amateur efforts go awry - someone who knows where I went wrong and how to solve it. I would like to return the service in some small way. As I have simplified my life, I have uncovered a need to discover an underlying passion that I can devote myself to fully, as a hobby or as a career. My partner's is his job - he is training as a mental health nurse and he is passionate about all things related to it. At the same time he is obsessed with cars and is also developing his beer making and bread baking skills with gusto. I am quite frankly envious of his passion.
This year I hope to uncover at least one thing that captures my attention to the point of obsession. The only way to do that of course it to continue to read and experiment widely, perhaps more widely than I have in even in recent years. If there is something that captivates you - whether that be composting, fruit growing, car mechanics, astronomy, languages or music, then find the time to devote to it and share it with others. The internet has opened up the opportunities for self study in most fields - though it pays to be discerning - and there are online communities devoted to every subject you could wish to immerse yourself in. There is distinct pleasure to be had in being an amateur, there is yet another pleasure to be found in knowing a subject inside out and becoming masterful - and (at least I hope that) there is no reason that you can't experience both in a lifetime.
7 comments:
I am so glad you posted this.
In fact, I believe it is actually better to have well-rounded interests that are studied in depth. It helps to synthesize and guide you to the basic principles, and in doing so, you end up learning more powerfully about how to problem-solve in other fields.
So many of my colleagues who came from educational systems where they only studied one subject with no general education courses, are terrible problem-solvers. They know only one thing and one method of doing that thing, and when a challenge appears, they try to solve it by brute force, by simply re-applying the same methods over and over, 14 hours/day, for months on end. If you solve the same exact problem in a couple of weeks, working only a few hours per day as you could spare, by methods you learned from a different field, they don't consider you efficient or clever--they consider you LAZY! Or possibly tricksy, in that you might be either lying or have stolen the idea.
But auto repair and reactor engineering have a lot in common. Brewing beer and wine, and brewing biotech drugs, have a lot in common. Importantly, you learn about possibilities, you learn how to learn from your mistakes--so many people insist that thus-and-such SHOULD have worked, when it clearly did not work at all, and instead of learning from the mistake and correcting their ideas, they persist in making the same mistake. You learn how to be good at learning, while the specialists simply become comfortable in their expertise and forget how to be an idiot who makes mistakes.
It is definitely under-valued in this modern world.
I definitely know what you mean about being passionate about what you do. Joseph has such a passion and enjoyment in his career choice, and I've often been envious about his drive and desire to learn more in his field. He simply has a hard time understanding that (beyond family) I don't have a stirring passion. I just haven't found it yet.
Keep looking!
Emma
City Roots, Country Life
I'm content to be a generalist, which is good I think, since I'm a homesteader and want our homestead to become even more homesteady. Homesteaders need to be generalists, which goes against the grain of more and more specialization that our culture promotes. I certainly have a lifelong obsession with all aspects of food, so homesteading fits neatly into that obsession. But even if it didn't, I think there's value in being a generalist.
One of the things I love about this lifestyle is that learning never ends. Just when I think there is nothing else I could do to improve my self-sufficiency a new skill presents itself. Cheese making is on this list this year..
This is not to say that I do now want to specialize in something. For me it is knitting. I am a avid knitter. From this passion I have found ways for it to earn some income, I sell knitted garments and next fall I hope to be a knitting teacher for our adult ed.
So I think for me it is trying to find the balance between being a specialist and being a generalist.
I'm a generalist like Kate - and love learning new things like Fleecenik - but sometimes regret that I'm not a master anything in particular too. I very much enjoy doing all the things I do but don't know if I enjoy them enough to concentrate on them to the exclusion of others.
That's not to say I can't pass on the skills I do have though - teaching the basics rather than advanced troubleshooting. Perhaps someone I get started will then go onto become a master and I'll have someone to learn from!
When you mentioned the "elder non-fiction books" it make me think of some of the ones in my collection. One is a book of projects that can b e made for the home and farm..from around 1940. Another was a book of household tips from the early 1940s. There's something about the 1940s...it wasn't intentional :) :) In any case, in the project book, there's a complete how to for taking the seats of a Model T car and turning it into a sofa :) :)
In terms of what I'm passionate about, it's definitely knitting and hand-sewing. Those are two things I absolutely LOVE to do!!! Thanks for the great post today :):) Love and hugs from Oregon, Heather :)
Thank you for all your comments
Emma - I hope that you find something. When I find mine, I think I will drive My OH up the wall enthusing about it, in payback for his years of doing the same to me : )
Kate - I agree that specialization is over rewarded in this day and age. It sounds though like you have found one thing (food) that everything else drops naturally into place around.
Fleecenik - Textiles are a perfect example. I can teach the basics, but frequently need someone to pull me out of (literal holes) in my crochet! Good luck with your project.
Louisa - I am the same, I can teach the basics of many things. But I would like to develop something to a higher level.
Heather - most modern teach yourself/DIY type books don't seem to do their subjects justice. I have several editions of language learning books spanning 50 years from the same publisher; and the quality of information and rigour seems to shrink with every decade.
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