What are you Horrible at?
The effective learner
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Firstly, I would like the reader to be acquainted with who I am. My name is Liam and for those who know me, it might come as a shock to see me transition into a writer... "This pretentious [insert curse word here]."
I must admit that I have not always had this burning passion for the art of writing as I always had this notion that it was not for me, I was in no way a "Wordsmith," nor was I literate in any sense of the word, "Who the hell is Nabokov right?" I was in a rather poor state as you can imagine, but then something truly miraculous happened.
I felt a little something called loneliness with a shot of self-loathing and I did not know how to cope with it in a healthy way. Eventually, after many twists and turns, I picked up a book called "Helter Skelter" and started reading. It felt better than the other things I did to get my mind off of my personal problems, but I'll spare you all the juicy details of my downward spiral and personal matters as I do not trust you all that much my beautiful reader.
As I read more books, I felt this soothing sensation that I have just found something that I liked that was sort of new to me. I hated reading, I hated writers because they are the most pretentious people on this God-given earth. Maybe they are, but some of them are also some of the best people on this earth.
I developed a passion for something I was not good at, nor had any idea of how to remotely improve myself for the better. Except, I just kept on trying to find self-help books on how to write, listening to writer's talk about how they write, broadening the ol' vocabulary and obsess about being better than I was yesterday; which is the goal for almost everyone in whatever field they choose their expertise.
Enough about me. Let's get to the point now.
What I want you to do today is to ask yourself what you are horrible at. Be it public speaking, writing, dancing, loving, programming or even baking – I don't care what it is. Find something you think you are horrible at and improve it, just for the hell of it. I might sound like a cheap watered-down version of Joel Osteen right now, but, that's okay, I can live with it... to a certain extent of course.
Find that skill, activity or mindset that you would want or that you might even need to accomplish what you want to accomplish. Educate yourself on topics that do not seem important to you, it sounds so unproductive, right? Yet, how many times have we wished to have known how to dance salsa, be able to build a decent personal computer or edit a video?
We, young people, have something truly glorious on our side and at our disposal, that is the time to be able to gain as much knowledge as we can about anything that we want. Do not rely on the service of others who know more than you or simply are more specialized in a skill. Of course, it is important to stay realistic, not all of us are astrophysicists but we can still read about astrophysics and know the basics as to what protons, neutrons, dark matter and photons are.
It might just surprise you at what you, yes YOU, are capable of knowing and putting it to use in the modern society we live in.
Please take this condescending advice from this former drop-out.
Keep on learning and never bow-down.
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Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this blogpost are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official views of Phryme Magazine.