the joy in learning

 the value of a liberal-arts education

the reason for a school is first utilitarian:

the learning of skills to read, to compute, to write,

to thus be enabled to act upon the world

with paper, books, keyboards, computers,

then it's time to deal with the "why" to have those skills,

is it to be marketable? to have a job?

or is even having a job a means to another end?

is not the role of a job to enable us to have a life?

we are not here on Earth just to provide for our body,

though that is a prime directive we must follow,

after our material needs are met, life can be much more,

for example, there is joy in learning, 

in realizing that the universe is wondrous

in the rules by which it runs,

in every lens through which truth can be glimpsed,

in the awesome beauty readily accessible to us

with a walk outside,

with the pushing of ourselves into a sport,

into an art, into a release of the intelligence we have

in the understanding of ourselves in the physical,

in the inter-personal, in the introspective, in the spiritual,

at each step in school, we should embrace the joy of just learning, 

of appreciating where we are ignorant

and thrilling in the awareness of every step forward

in feeling the rightness revealed,

as a species we need a liberal arts education,

to be stretched academically, to learn for the sake of learning,

to approach a class that might feel dauntingly foreign

until we get to know it as a friend,

we stretch ourself into learning about ourselves and how we learn,

and sharing that journey with our friends,

if we choose to be a welder, or a cook, or a bus driver, great!

particularly, if, in our soul, we still search every moment

for what it can teach us,

for what it can reveal of how the universe works,

our species needs us to open our selves to revelation,

revelation accessible to all who but think and feel with passion.

by Henry H. Walker

June 7, ‘24