Day: January 15, 2018

Daily Prompt:  Study

 

According to Merriam-Webster, study is the application of the mental faculties to the acquisition of knowledge.

Does this look familiar?  I remember sitting just like this preparing for tests in school.  But not always.  My earliest memories of going to school and studying are from first grade.  I would run in the house after school anxious to do my homework.  Usually spelling.  I loved spelling.  It came easily to me.  I remember we had a desk in the hallway where I happily sat every day writing my spelling words.

As I grew older and progressed through elementary school, things didn’t come quite so easily to me.  But, I still loved school and usually got right to the studying at home for the numerous tests that Sister seemed to give almost daily.  I didn’t quite have the same admiration for the study work I had once had, but I knew that if I didn’t do it I would spend the rest of the year in trouble.  So, I studied.

Then high school hit.  Wow!  What was I thinking?  I finally realized how easy elementary school was.  Studying then was a piece of cake.  Now I had totally new concepts to learn.  Biology, Algebra, Math Analysis!  I still don’t understand what Math Analysis is.  I did figure out that I could expand my social life by belonging to study groups.  A definite plus to studying.  Unfortunately, you actually have to study to get the benefit from belonging to one.  Oops!

It was at this time that I really began to dislike school.  Well, that’s not exactly right.  I loved school, just not the studying part of it.  I did, however, trudge along and did graduate with a decent GPA and was accepted to college.

I didn’t want to go to college right away.  I wanted to experience the world a little bit first.  My parents didn’t see things the same way that I did.  So, come August off I went to Community College.  OMG!  What a rude awakening.

Needless to say, I was not successful.  I felt ill prepared for navigating through the copious amount of work needed to succeed.  As I look back at it now, I realize that my perspective was skewed.  I lasted about a year in college then dropped out.  My parents were not very happy.  So off to the workforce I went.  I worked for Bell Telephone as a Directory Assistant.  Talk about a boring job.

My success or lack of it had nothing to do with intelligence.  It had more to do with my thinking.  I looked at school, studying, as work.  Not as an opportunity to obtain knowledge for knowledge’s sake.  I had not yet learned that knowledge is power.

I married, had a family then decided I needed more.  All of a sudden studying wasn’t such an obstacle for me.  I attended nursing school.  I soared.  I realized that studying was a means for me to accomplish my dreams.  I worked very hard.  I ran study groups.  I inspired younger students to work hard.  I was having fun.

Throughout my career in nursing, I studied constantly.  In medicine, there is always something new to learn.  I couldn’t get enough.  I guess you could say I was a late bloomer.  I honestly think that maturity had more to do with my success than anything else.  I honestly believe that all students should have to work a year before going to college.  I think it brings a perspective that having an education handed to you does not.  At least it would have for me.  You can’t appreciate what you can have if you never go without it.

I continue to study.  I read every day.  Fiction, non-fiction, history, religion.  I like to say that I never met a book I didn’t like.  The difference now is that I look at study as a pleasure not work.  Some days I am as giddy as that little first grader running into the house anxious to write my spelling words.

Wanda