How to learn?

There are 2 ways of learning things.

• Spoonfeeding
• Trial and error

Spoonfeeding refers to all the kind of learning you that involves another person showing you the ropes. Well, I wouldn't even say that. It involves an authority figure oversimplifying concepts to fit a particular model of thinking, and telling you how to do something the right way Call it whatever—education, mentorship, apprenteurship—at the end of the day, it's about a person trying to teach you things in an oversimplified way.

That's the kind of learning that makes you less curious about things. But for some reason, that's the kind of learning that's encouraged by "society". Here's how they usually show their disapproval.

• People value degrees more than actual experience
• They mock you for not doing things their way

There's this whole set of rules and standards that are thrusted upon us to follow, if you want to claim yourself as a person who has "learned" something.

And if that weren't enough, they have this one justification for why things are so standardized.

So anyone can learn.

Which is such bullshit.

I don't know about you, but I've been doing things by trial and error since I was born. Here are my earlier accomplishments

• I learned how to walk
• I learned how to talk
• I learned how to use the bathroom

And I didn't have to graduate from a prestigious university to do so. Sure, my parents helped me, but ultimately, there was an element of trial and error in it (far more than all the stuff I've studied in school or college).

I gotta say, I'm not really perfect in those things

• I walk weirdly sometimes, but people call that a "walking style"
• I pronounce some words weirdly, but people call that an "accent"
• Let's not get into the third example

But you know what they don't call them? Mistakes. A word that's otherwise in common parlance when it comes to "learning" things otherwise.

Why can't we adopt the same attitude when it comes to doing other things? I think that'll encourage people to do trial and error.

And yeah, I get it, I'm no trial and error purist. There are places where spoonfeeding is required. You can't just trial and error your way into doing cardiac surgery. But I'm willing to bet that there are a lot of places where this isn't required either.

• You don't need to learn sheet music to play an instrument.
• You don't need a computer science degree to write a blog post like this in html
• You don't need to be a mechanic to fix things around the house
• You don't need to be a woman to cook (I'm still trying to learn this lesson)

Also bonus points for being independence.

Take me back home