How Do You Learn

Someone once asked me how I learn and that question has been a never ending source of interest for me ever since. I finally said I learn by repetition, by doing something, or saying it, over and over, which is technically correct.

It is how I learn facts, or doing concrete things like completing tasks at the museum, or any of the other volunteer jobs I occasionally do. It is how I learn to navigate airports, or use a library.

It is not how I learn to do creative things, which makes my performance at these things, or in them, very problematic. I play the piano by reading the notes and practicing, (which is repetitive,) but I memorize in some way I do not understand. My fingers learn the song, or they don't, which is the scary thing about it. It is not a systematic, or sure thing by a long shot.

It is not how I write either. I know the mechanics of good writing. I am pretty good at sprinkling those punctuation marks in all the right places and I can spell, or use a spell checker with the best of them. I am also pretty adept at writing factual pieces, but creative ones are much harder to explain. Some part of me, whose access I can't tick off in a one, two, three method comes up with the ideas and forms and I am left to judge whether it is good, very good, or even bad. I have several methods for this judging and they would terrify any rational person.

If it makes me feel the way I want my readers to feel, then I think it is pretty good. If it seems to paint a picture of what I want the reader to see, I also feel pretty good, but sometimes I just read it out loud and pull a Nordic rune from a bag of runes. If it is right side up, I go ahead. If it is upside down, I rewrite. Really scientific, huh?

I have been known to get so upset with the way the runes fall that I huff and puff like an angry child, but I do not ignore them and believe it, or not, it has served me well. ( I just drew the rune for Harvest, or Jera, which has no up, or down, that's always a good sign.) Of course, how I rewrite is part of it too. If I feel I am close, I may only change a word, or two, so it is really more in my control than it may sound. And yet.....

I am the first one to admit this is a crazy way to write, but it is how I do it. Sometimes I will spend seven or eight hours on a two and a half page story. Other times, I will write something like My Thots in under an hour. It's all the same for me. I love the doing, so it doesn't really matter how long it takes, only that I am satisfied at the end.

I think this is the ideal. If everyone could live this way, life would always be a joy. Doing what I love makes even the biggest, or hardest job so much easier for me than it would be for someone else who didn't love it.

I suspect that I learn the things I love quickly, but perhaps I love the things I learn quickly.