Burden or Blessing?

A burden is identified as a heavy load; something that weighs you down. A blessing is defined as a beneficial thing for which one is grateful. Education is often looked at in a negative light – it is seen as a chore, a form of childhood enforcement, but most importantly, a burden of sorts. I believe this view point needs to change.

Education is not defined by what level you received in your SATS, how many GCSE’s you obtained, how many A-Levels you took, what degree you studied and where and how much your current salary is. That is not education – that is the education system.

Education is ‘the process of facilitating learning, or the acquisition of knowledge, skills, values, beliefs, and habits.’

Education is learning how to speak to new people – how to adapt your speech, body language and demeanour when speaking to different age and ability groups. It is knowing what vocabulary to execute, how to present yourself professionally, how to question, respond and communicate efficiently.

Education is obtaining new information, and no, this does not mean memorising every inch of the periodic table or knowing every mathematical equation that has emerged across the decades. This does not mean having the ability to translate every language across the world or being fit enough to run over 8 metres non-stop. It is simply the process of learning something new – did you know that if eaten in one meal, 30 to 90 grams of polar bear liver is enough to kill a human being? Or that there are more life forms living on your skin than there are people on the planet? You have just learnt something new, and that is what Education is.

Education is gaining a new skill, something that your mind and body are yet to have practiced. This could be something as small as learning how to operate machinery, exercising a new filing and organising routine or even picking up a different method of completing tasks – it could be expanding to new forms of teamwork, adopting a new approach to problem solving, executing efficient negotiations or even arising to leadership roles.

Education is the enhancement of your mindset – it is learning to open all the closed doors your mind has constructed against values, beliefs, explanations, reasons, problems, people and anything else that may evoke debate. It is persuading your mind and attitude to consider a new way of thinking and living, as well as adopting an openness to being understanding.

Education is all of these things and more – it is a form of growth. It is a blessing that not many people have had the opportunity to acquire; there are those in the world who do not know a hundredth of the knowledge that we so blindly call a ‘burden.’ It is our ticket to evolving, developing and becoming a better version of ourselves, for our future and for the ones to come after us.

Now I ask you, how can that be a burden??