How we learn

If you go to an office supply store today, you will more than likely see a huge display of new office furniture. They look great, all set up with the fake plants and books on the shelves, like a model home in a new development. You think to yourself, this would look nice in my home office. So you take the tag up to the register and purchase your new modular desk set, with matching file cabinets. To your amazement, the clerk brings out two boxes, the size of a coffee table that weigh eighty pounds apiece, and crams them in into your trunk.

When you open the boxes at home, you find twenty sheets of particle board with a vinyl, wood-grain sticker on one side, and an assortment of pieces and parts. You also receive a set of instructions, written by someone for whom English is a second language.

"Part A going into the Part B screwing tight by application of three of Part C screws," etc. Look,if they are going through all the trouble to ship this stuff half way around the world, is it too much to ask that the instructions make sense? I have assembled a few of these in my day, and I can honestly say the instructions are much better than they used to be. At least today they use pictures.

Computer hardware and software is another story all together. The instructions are in English, or high-tech English to be exact, detailed in every way, and almost completely useless. The instructions are so complex, unless you have a degree in computer engineering given out in the last two years; you are going to have to call tech support to get it working.

Not everyone is challenged when it comes to instructions and instruction manuals. I know people who will open a package, actually read through the entire manual, and referring back to it a few times during the process, will build or install anything the correct way, the first time. I hate these people. I really do.

I learn by doing, or to be more precise, I learn by screwing things up. I have a history of building things only to have to tear them apart, twice, and then rebuild them the right way. It is a bit frustrating, but I have resigned myself to this particular way of learning. As you may imagine, I would not make a good bomb technician, parachute packer, or high-rise building engineer. I am pretty good at thinking outside the box and coming up with new ways to get things done, but the tiny details sometimes elude me. Most of the time it’s messy, but it usually works.

There is another way to learn; by watching other people screw up. Like I said, I am great at screwing things up. You could say I have a black belt making mistakes. However, screwing up office furniture, and Jeep engines are minor inconveniences. I am talking about watching people wreck their lives.

Having seen people make bad decisions that affect not only their lives, but also the lives of their family and friends, has made me very aware of the real life consequences of my own actions. Believe me; I made my share of really bad decisions over the years, and I probably have a few more in my system that will come out somewhere down the line. The point I am trying to make is if there are lessons to learn from someone else’s mistake, learn them well. It is much less painless.

It is easy to armchair quarterback someone's life from afar. There is an endless supply of celebrities who seem to make a career of making destructive choices. It is harder when the people screwing up their lives are close to us. No matter how hard we try, no matter how much we care for a person, we are usually unable to stop them from making a wreck of their lives. It can be devastating. Sometimes, the only possible good that comes out a terrible situation is being able to learn from their mistakes.

From completely irresponsible financial decisions, terrible relationship decisions, or falling into destructive addictions, these are real life situations that are happening all around us. If you spend a few decades on this planet, you will see most everything. I have seen firsthand how to screw up your life with any number of poor decisions, and I have tried to learn from them, and not to repeat them.

There are a few things I don’t want to learn by doing.