5 Practical Things School May Not Teach You
Your real life begins after graduation
Don’t get me wrong. I love learning and I also believe in higher education. But did you know there are things you just don’t learn while in school?
I got an awakening one day, and like millions of other young people, I discovered how easy it was to get a credit card.
- Bills And Credit Cards
The school didn’t teach me that it was important to pay off your credit card bill at the end of the month. The interest alone is frightening.
When I was young, it was so easy to feel rich with the swipe of a credit card on a brand new outfit or dining out with friends. Months later, I racked up thousands of dollars in credit card bills and could only pay them off a little at a time. Before long, it was overwhelming, and the statement just got higher and higher.
Months later, my parents bailed me out of my credit card blues. I learned the hard lesson that having a credit card is not a license to spend freely. Nowadays, I pay off my statements at the end of the month to avoid accruing interest. Whereas before I had several credit cards, today, I only have one and I always pay off the balance before the due date.
I also have a credit card that pays me to fly or I can use it for grocery purchases. Check into this option and you, too, can be earning when you are using your credit card.
If you get a credit card, realize that it’s not your money and you are just borrowing it until you pay it back later!
2. How To Change A Tire.
Years ago, I left a friend’s house and suddenly I became aware that my car was getting lower and lower and it was almost hugging the ground. Pretty soon, it was flat, and I made my way slowly to the corner. It was pouring rain and although I had a spare tire in my car, I was clueless and didn’t know how to change it. I still don’t. (I can fix an iPhone, though)
I had no one to call, and no boyfriend at the time. Despite my problems, I flagged down a grumpy stranger, and he quickly changed my flat tire with the spare one in my trunk and accepted my payment of $25.
I had a situation last year where my tire was too flat to drive home. After waiting, my husband drove over and measured the tire pressure, and added some air. Nowadays, I don’t drive much but I would likely use a tow truck to take my car to the nearest tire store if that happened.
I also check my tires every few months to avoid a flat tire. How many drivers actually know how to change their tires if the situation called for it? I don’t have any data on this but I believe there would be a fine market for a live course in teaching people how to change their own tires.
If you ever get a flat tire, always keep a spare tire in your car — just in case a stranger decides to help you change it.
3. How To Talk To Everybody
I was painfully shy in high school and it wore away somewhat in university. Still, it was difficult for me to communicate with everyone without blushing. Over the years, the shyness wore off like old skin and I am so much better than my old self.
Had I learned to communicate better, I would have been able to talk more freely in class, apply for a management role at work, and to be more assertive with other people in my life.
It’s important to communicate effectively and no history or political science course can teach you this. I eventually did take an acting class which allowed me to experience another side of myself.
4. Knowing What To Do In Life.
It was rewarding to take courses and I loved learning about different things at university. But the bottom line is that I was often clueless as to what job I would be better suited for.
I drifted into jobs that held very little satisfaction for me. I was too cheap or had little confidence to spend money on a film or writing program, which in the end was my true calling. Years later, I ended up taking a night school film editing program that I loved! I ended up having 2 of my short films selected for screening at a festival in Toronto.
So my advice is to find your passion, and have the guts to embrace it. If that means taking a course, or changing careers — go for it!
5. Love Is A Subject That Is Never Taught
Why is it that school or university can teach us about writing, math, and science, but the really big things like “Love” are very rarely taught?
Yet it is the single most important thing that makes us all human. Love is so essential for us to be human. It allows us to be caring towards each other. Yet, some of us are often victims of oppressive love — the kind where the man or woman gets beaten or even killed by their abusive partner.
I never learned how to find a good partner in university or to avoid people that are dubious. Perhaps, I was too trusting. Life teaches you that it is important to trust your gut instincts and leave certain (bad) people alone.
Love is not just about loving someone else. It’s also about self-esteem and self-love. Self-esteem will protect you from landing into relationships that are not healthy and destructive. That was me, years ago. I didn’t feel happy being alone and I wrongly surrounded myself with men that were essentially losers and users. Friends or family members never came to my rescue. One day, I came to the realization that it was time to walk away from this madness and when that happened, I was able to work toward finding a healthy relationship.
Love is so important to our human existence, yet it is never in any school curriculum. One man -God bless him — had the guts to shock the establishment years ago and started a Love Course.
His name is Leo Buscaglia. This unorthodox university professor, moved by a student’s suicide, embarked on a new noncredit course at the University of Southern California, which he named, “Love 1.A.” His course was a big hit, and his lectures later got picked up by the Public Broadcasting Service in the 1980s. He was the author of a book called, “Love,” which I reread several times after a bad breakup. It helped so much. Fortunately, you can still find some grainy footage of some of his lectures on Youtube
He passed away far too soon at the age of 74 years old in 1998 and to this day, I remember his teachings. Every now and then, I pick up his book to remind me of how life is so much better when you have love.
Sone of my favorite quotes from this wonderful man includes:
- Love yourself-accept yourself-forgive yourself-and be good to yourself, because without you the rest of us are without a source of many wonderful things.
- Each of us is responsible for creating an environment of warmth and consideration for those we love. I have always tried to define a good day not in terms of one in which all things were made right and comfortable for me but rather, as a day in which I have been able to make another’s day more loving and special for them. We must treat each other with dignity. Not because we merit it but because we grow best in thoughtfulness.
- A loving relationship is one in which the loved one is free to be himself — to laugh with me, but never at me; to cry with me, but never because of me; to love life, to love himself, to love being loved. Such a relationship is based upon freedom and can never grow in a jealous heart
- We are not for everyone and everyone is not for us. The question is, ‘If we cannot be with another, can we at least not hurt them? Can we, at least, find a way to coexist?’
I remember he also said that love has a way of rebounding. It is always there to retrieve and you can refuel your soul with love anytime. I was heartbroken after breaking up with my first love years ago. Leo taught me that love never dies -you can have it again and again. You can learn to retrieve your feelings and send your heart to someone else. It’s a miracle emotion. He was right. I eventually found a man that was stable and caring and worthy of my love.
In fact, loving someone else is risky business. Who can say that they will love you back? In my experience, the more loving things you do for someone, the greater your chances of receiving the love back. Try it with your cat. I always pet my cats and always receive a cat’s smile in return. Humans are a little more complicated. You cannot pet them, but you can do warm, loving things.
An autistic kid at school was reluctant to get off the swing. I was a bit worried. A little girl came up to me and said, “Don’t worry. He listens to me.” “Why,” I asked. She replied simply, “I am always kind to him,” she said, adding, that sometimes when her teachers or mother yell at her, she is reluctant to listen to them.
I never met Leo personally but somehow I found his compassion and his love emanating from his books. He is telling me that our human potential is so much better when we use the power of love.
This emotion can trickle down in different ways. It may mean opening the door for anyone, (not just someone who is elderly), or contributing to someone’s Go Fund Me Campaign, or it could mean calling an elderly relative to bring over a care package, and asking how he or she is doing. Love means replacing road rage with empathy for the other driver, who may have lost his or her job, or had a fight with the spouse. Love is so much more than loving one’s partner!
That’s all today. I would like to give one of my readers a big shoutout:
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