PEELING BACK THE LAYERS OF NAIVETY

A Realisation Of Naivety & Relearning

Having received what is considered a good education at an English private school, I assumed I had been given the best tools to ‘do well’ in life. Financially, this may or may not be the case, but what I realise now is that school, no matter how much it costs, does not currently prepare any of us for a healthy, happy and kind life. We learn English, but not how to communicate better. We learn Maths, but not how to consciously apply problem solving in life. We learn Science, but not how to maintain the health of ourselves, others or the planet. For some of us, we may have learned to make butter from cream, bake bread or throw together an omelette. At no point was nutrition and good mental and physical health a key point of the curriculum. Sports lessons are often a mixture of those who are fitter, due to having built up a level of fitness in their formative years, and those who will do anything to avoid having to try, join in or even show up.

What we learn as children

We learn to do what our parents do, even if we don’t do what they say. We learn that adults are there to protect us and provide for us. We learn that there are rules and regulations which protect us from harm or misfortune. We learn to trust doctors and teachers but mistrust strangers. We learn that knowledge enables us to make the right decisions. We learn that to have freedom, we need money. We learn that to succeed is to financially gain. We learn that we are generally safe from disease because there is medicine. We learn that others’ time is limited for us. We learn that newer, bigger, faster or pricier is better. We learn that to fail regularly makes us a failure.

What we then learn

After time, some of us then learn and potentially ignore some key lessons. We learn that our parents don’t know everything and they are still trying to get through their own life. We learn that adults and doctors can’t always keep us safe. We learn that companies are there to make money, not to look after us. We learn that doctors and teachers are human, they have families of their own, they shop at the same supermarkets, and they don’t know everything. We learn that strangers often have good intentions but we can’t always tell them apart from those who don’t. We learn that even with knowledge, we often make mistakes and only some of us are willing to learn from them. We learn that money can bring us moments of what we deem to be happiness, but it doesn't last long.

A very small proportion of us learn that we learn very little that is valuable from success and much that is valuable from failure.

Photo by K8 on Unsplash - thanks for the free image. I thought I’d give you a mention.