Here and There

No one learns everything about life at one time or from one person.  We learn a little bit at a time from different experiences, at different ages, and from different people.  We learn from books and from the creativity of scientists, teachers, writers, inventors, and from people in every walk of life.  In short, we learn a little bit here and a little bit there.

 

As infants, we are learning how to survive in an unfamiliar world.  When we are learning how to read, we start with recognizing the letters of the alphabet and learning the sounds of the letters.  What we don’t do, and can’t do, is go from sounding out the letters of the alphabet to reading Tolstoy’s War and Peace.  Before we can read at that level, we have had to progress through the different reading levels of books as well as experiencing a great deal of life.

 

We may age chronologically, but we don’t experience life chronologically.  Some people have had to grow up quickly and they are old for their age; some people never grow up.  But all of us acquire experience, knowledge, and wisdom, not in one fell swoop, but a little bit at a time, here and there.