i came across this article on a blog i frequent that, although pertaining to church, religion and christianity, it essentially can be applied to life and personal growth/development in general. to summarize, the author begins by questioning the need to go to church… asking “why go to church week after week, month after month, year after year…if they’re just going to basically remind you of what you already know? am i really so infantile that i need to be reminded every week of what is essentially ‘common sense’?” true, it may prove to be beneficial and good for some people which is totally fine. but why do so many christians feel that one absolutely HAS to attend church every week in order to develop a better relationship with god?
he then relates this situation with his grade school days when in elementary school… looking back at how much of a waste of time everything was now that we realize it. he suggests that it was a huge waste of time “learning addition, long division, multiplication tables, the revolutionary war, over…and over…and over again…1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade…on and on and on. oh to think about all the other things that could’ve been learned! like maybe something about world history? foreign languages? art theory/practice? the possibilities are endless. now as sad as that is to think about the waste of a child’s mind in the hands of an educational system that caters to the lowest common denominator, would i not be repeating the same pattern as an adult if i just kept going to church every week of my life getting spoon-fed the same words in exactly the same way every week?”
this is very similar to how i feel about things. if you compare our education system in the united states with those in foreign countries, especially across europe and eastern asia, ours definitely is put to shame. in a way i feel like i’ve been robbed of the ability to gain a more diverse wealth of knowledge and education. why aren’t we taught a lot more while we are younger and more capable of remembering/learning it? why don’t we have the ability to learn a foreign language until high school rather than during elementary school which would be much easier? why don’t we value the power of knowledge as much as we should? for most people, learning ends once they graduate… especially if only graduating from high school. that’s not what life is about. we should be curious… questioning everything and needing to know more about the world that surrounds us. we should be learning throughout our entire lives, which is why i don’t think many people are an expert at anything… being an expert suggests one is all-knowing. no one is all-knowing; there will always be something more and a deepening personal evolution before us.