Are life's lessons worth the cost of learning them?
I think this varies from person to person. Some people never learn, they just go through life undergoing as Saul Alinsky once wrote a series of happenings that pass through their systems undigested. Some of the lessons I’ve learned took years to emerge and become apparent. The folly of religion. The white-washed histories of many countries. The challenges of living with birth defects or mental illness. The persistence of early childhood teachings imprinted on defenseless children by their parents. Freud once noted that we spend our adult lives dealing with the residue of our childhoods. I’ve seen that so many times here and there. The mountains of mythological rubbish taught with violence by so many different religions. In the end, if one learns a lesson, it’s worth it. In a conference session I once taught about this very topic, sharing one’s life’s lessons with others, a colleague said wait a minute, that’s like sharing your pearls before swine. I knew what he meant, I’d read that scripture many times. My reply was if you worked hard and suffered to learn an important lesson, why would you want to take it to your grave with you? Why wouldn’t you want to share that with your fellow pilgrims? Who says they are swine?
I think this varies from person to person. Some people never learn, they just go through life undergoing as Saul Alinsky once wrote a series of happenings that pass through their systems undigested. Some of the lessons I’ve learned took years to emerge and become apparent. The folly of religion. The white-washed histories of many countries. The challenges of living with birth defects or mental illness. The persistence of early childhood teachings imprinted on defenseless children by their parents. Freud once noted that we spend our adult lives dealing with the residue of our childhoods. I’ve seen that so many times here and there. The mountains of mythological rubbish taught with violence by so many different religions. In the end, if one learns a lesson, it’s worth it. In a conference session I once taught about this very topic, sharing one’s life’s lessons with others, a colleague said wait a minute, that’s like sharing your pearls before swine. I knew what he meant, I’d read that scripture many times. My reply was if you worked hard and suffered to learn an important lesson, why would you want to take it to your grave with you? Why wouldn’t you want to share that with your fellow pilgrims? Who says they are swine?
After retiring, I wrote A Song of Humanity: A Science-based Alternative to the World’s Scriptures to try to provide a summary on One Man’s life’s lessons. In my case, it’s all out there for others to see, read, reflect, reject, or incorporate as they wish. A Song of Humanity Posted on Quora.
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