INTRODUCTION
We are facing a worldwide crisis, we find ourselves relying on traditional education for a brighter future, Universities are creating more and more graduates at an alarming rate yet the corporate world does not have enough vacancies to employ these graduates.
Technology is taking over, the industrial age’s laborious tasks have been replaced by the Information age’s labor known as robots, everything around us is evolving but how is it that the one thing regarded as the key to success is not evolving? Institutionalized education still remains the same yet success factors are evolving.
The Author in his position feels the need to address the drudgery created by institutionalized education; he is in the best position to write this book, he holds a University qualification and has had a fair share of his life as an employee, he has had to watch some of his dreams disappear because they somehow did not confirm to the standards of the education system.
This book titled Un-school me takes a walk into the life of the author from the first day he was introduced to institutionalized or classroom education to the days of his early career stages, the author then seeks to argue that education kills the “genius” in many kids and replaces it with boring subjects of no interest.
The reader should read the book with an open mind and allow him/her to be challenged, the author believes the best form of education is self-education; this form of education better prepares an individual for personal, spiritual and financial growth.
“Children must be raised with the ability to challenge authority, for they become creative thinkers”-CN Marweshe
- SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
Here I am thinking education was meant to develop the inner creativity we are born with! How would one define education anyway? There are many definitions but I choose to define education as “the wealth of knowledge and skill acquired by an individual through learning and training, which is usually driven by a well-informed individual through application of literature of some sort”.
During my high school days many of us were propelled into the world of math and science with believe that if you get good grades in those subjects you will become an engineer, a doctor, a scientist etc. and earn a good salary for the rest of your life. The thought of having a professional career with a good salary sounded great and it began to drive us to learn math and science with every piece of the brain.
Biggest mistake ever made by majority of the learners, the funny part about it is that it was an error generated by the education system itself, although I graduated as an Industrial Engineer and I have started my career on a high note I am still a great critic of the manner in which learners are driven from what they are passionate about to what they have no idea about.
One man who is a legend of creativity in the education system once said” we are trained how to become good employees instead of how to become critical thinkers”, these words seem light but trust me they are very powerful, most of the people in the corporate world have spent years at university going through subjects that they are not even applying today in their daily jobs!
That itself should raise questions about the level of education that we grow up into, I believe if the government together with concerned citizens reviewed that system and made it to groom critical, strategic, innovative and business minded individuals then there would be less worry about the increasing statistics of “unemployment”, this education system is the main reason to unemployment, many learners are made to believe that after matriculating you need to go and get a University education because that is the only route to success, but what happens when the learner either fails matric or has no financial support to continue with college studies? The answer is simple: most of us lose hope, sit at home and spend years frustrating about University education, which leads to many other issues we are facing today, the likes of crime, poverty, diseases and a continued generations of financial disadvantage.
The system should accommodated for every natural talent of every learner, instead of brainwashing learners about getting good grades in math and science, a University degree and a secure career. I once read a book called “rich dad, poor dad”-Robert Kiyosaki, and through that book I noticed most parents are also misinformed and as a result they fail to realize the change happening and are still driving their kids into the old route of good grades, good career.
In today’s world there are countless opportunities for success, yet due to the system every individual is channeled into the same tunnel and as a result it becomes survival of the fittest, but who are the fittest? I will refer to the above mentioned scenario of math and science world, if two hundred students are made to study math and science and only thirty are passionate about it, chances are only that thirty will make it through because it is what they are passionate about, they do it with the inner desire to succeed and most probably have already planned the next step, the remaining number will struggle because they are made to believe that math and science are the only path in life, they are made to think they are passionate about it, yet the truth is they are clueless about it.
Now tell me what is creative about the education system? The system is currently designed like a national park with different animals in it, it is a food chain and only the fit will survive.
- SCHOOL CONTINUES
Speaking of high school, it was than time for me to go into high school in the year 2005, I had completed my primary level and I was looking forward to the next level. Prior that I had to make several applications with the help of my parents (my Mother was now living with us after she completed her college education), we had moved from the place where we used to stay when we first came to Gauteng and my parents had bought a house in a semi urban area, my life was not only about moving from one school to the next but it was also moving from one house to the next “quite the adventure”.
My parents suggested high schools I could apply at, but all the schools were in town and since I was not fond of the Afrikaans language I decided I had to go to a township school and take up Sepedi as one of my subjects, immediately I could see that my parents did not support the idea as they thought a school in town would make me a better man educationally, with the experiences I had been through I realised that the most important stage of growth for a human is during the early days of life, I had been through a lot and had worked hard to overcome superior challenges irrespective of the school I would go to.
I applied in three different township schools and was accepted into two, I had a choice to make and the choice I made was the best choice which also had more adventure and experience for me. High school is a stage whereby the leaner must come with a mind that knows what it wants and what the future should hold. In this level I realised that I was a good soccer player and overall I was a sportsperson. I had a dream to become a famous sports person, travel the world embracing sports fanatics, I had hoped that somehow with the aid of higher education and my parents I would realise my dream.
You see dear reader if there is something I have noticed is that most parents do not believe that their children can become something out of creativity, they believe that children should only get good grades, get a college education and get a secure job in the corporate world. During my first year in high school I asked my Father to help me get into a school that grows kids who wish to become soccer players, the old man was reluctant at first but eventually told me that he sent in an application but it was declined because they only accepted learners coming in fresh from primary, to this day I am not certain if that was the case.
I was very disappointed as I continued with my normal schooling, and I was playing soccer with the local community soccer team. The news that my Father had given me ate my passion away and I started believing that I would never become anything besides a corporate career person, I was doing good with my grades in that year, I decided to join the school soccer club and that was a decision that brought pain once again in my life. The reality is that the creative activities are mostly not driven by the education body but by individuals in those schools, I joined the soccer team but because I was young not known by anybody I would sit on the bench while a guy who I was ten times better than played in my central defence position, this was the result of joining a soccer team driven by close friends, whom choose to pull favours for each other instead of selecting a player because of merit.
Our school soccer team selected players based on social popularity instead of merit, I left it and focused on books only, my dream was slowly but surely fading away. I did not understand why it became so hard to just be in a position were by a young man can be able to show off his talent with the help of the education he woke up every day to go and embrace, when I look at it now, the most famous sportsmen, artists, entertainers and so forth did it because from day one their passion and creativity was incorporated into their daily school work, this is the situation in most European and Asian countries and of course our local private schools are also great enthusiasts of creativity.
The first year came to an end and we had to now focus on the next level in the following year, although I continued to play soccer with the local soccer team I did not see much development rather all I saw was young boys playing soccer so as to avoid becoming part of the ever growing statistics of drug and alcohol consumption. I began to realise that my life was taking a turn and I needed to start embracing change, after all change is inevitable.
The new year came and it was back to school nationwide and believe it or not even in the next grade most of the learners were not even sure of what they would want to become, at some point I would sit around my friends and quiz them about ten years in the future who will they be, most of them picked careers they could not even elaborate on. It was a confusing journey as I began to notice that we are in school but it appears there is no logic behind the whole schooling concept. I was one of the smart learners in school but my problem was that I was not passionate enough about getting good Grades, I preferred to take things slow and let nature take me forward with time, my parents would sometimes see me studying and be convinced that their son was really into becoming a great student. I only did that to avoid being shouted at all the time, I was still depressed by my dream fading away and did not see a point in sticking my face into textbooks all the time.
I spent the entire schooling year trying to figure out who I was and what I was meant to be, I have a quote for you that came along while I went deep into thoughts: “people are meant to become what they are destined to be, not what they are taught to become”, this saying is only active in small parts of the world because in our lives we are taken through education that prepares us to become good employees, make average salaries and believe it is fine to wake up early in the morning every day, work for eight hours or more a day and get underpaid while suffering from the ridiculous tax rates of everyday life.
The first two years of high school are a foundation phase as I view it and it prepares you for the remaining three years to come, as we welcomed the third year it was time for the life changing decisions to be made. In the first two years we are taught similar subjects that have the worst of both worlds, it is through that two years that you realise whether you can do the science, business or the general stream.
When the time to choose came we all started going through brochures with different subjects to choose from, I had always known that besides my passion for sports I was pretty decent at solving for x and determining velocity, so I decided to go for the science stream.
The system by that time had already brainwashed most of the learners into believing that math and science are the route to a perfect future, as a result many people chose that science stream with hope to secure a better future but had forgotten the consequences of being misinformed. I watched as several learners with excitement chose a stream their friends chose because they did not want to go into separate classes, and until this day I still believe that the system throws learners into a pit hole because there is not even enough knowledge behind choosing of subjects and how to determine what is suitable for you. The worst part about it was watching a friend choose the science stream although he was really not anything closer to that, as the year went by I began to notice that my friend would make a great actor either on screen or in the theatre but that would never be the case since arts and culture is treated as subjects for the primary kids, the minute you step into high school you can forget about your acting talent, your drawing ability or even your public speaking skill because at that point it is all about math and science.
We were all made to believe that math and science are a guarantee to a bright future and immediately all our dreams died as the focus was now on getting that “x and y” wherever they were hiding. Please note that I am not against people learning math and science, I am just against the system designed to make learners believe that no other route exists besides that one, if that was the case then the world would be full of engineers, doctors, scientists and the likes, isn’t it? There was one particular teacher when I was matriculating who encouraged all learners that math and science is the path to one of South Africa’s top universities and as a result created a negative competitive energy amongst the learners, if you did not worship math since he was a math teacher he did not take you as a serious person.
Being the kind of person that I am I had a fall out with him because I believed that he misled most learners and he created a negative environment, he thought otherwise. He would have extra classes for his top math learners in the afternoons and pamper them with numbers, to this day I did not understand why he preferred to help learners who were already good at math and side-lined the struggling ones whereas he was the reason most of them even decided to be math students.
By the time we were in matric most of the learners did not know what their natural talents were, they did not even know what they planned to do after passing the last grade, I began to realise that I was also lost in a way as my original dream had faded throughout the years, luckily I was never a comfortable person in life, realising that being a sportsman had evaded me I started developing passion for entrepreneurship.
On one morning while sitting and wondering what the future holds for me I began to realise that I was actually a far more creative person than I had thought, at that moment my parents were already talking about furthering my studies in the following year at a University somewhere in the country, I realised that I did not want to go to University because I had better plans for myself. Growing up in an African home with principles and values grounded from respect my parents thought I had gone delusional and stated that in their house there is no child who will refuse an opportunity to get a University qualification. I realise that the concept was misunderstood as my plan was to not ever further my studies, I had other plans in mind and at the same time I would study part time, but this was to turn into a big argument.
What many people around me did not understand is that I had realised I would make a great business person, I had realised I was meant to be a business mogul if not a sportsperson(multiple passions), During my final years in high school I was quite the businessman as I sold goodies such as sweets, like other learners but I realised I was quite unique as most of the people selling in schools only did it themselves, I was running an empire at some point as I had a couple of people sell for me in other schools and paid them based on money they turned in (called revenue in business language). This was not something I had made public but was a way of testing my business skills and people’s management skills. The only problem was with all the amazing Rands I made out of my high school business I was not quite good at managing the money, that did not really bother me as I always knew I could refine my cash flow management skills along the years, because I had already realised at that point in time that there was no module in school that clearly taught students the importance of positive cash flow management, the importance of reading and interpreting financial statements.
Although we were exposed to such terms in subjects such as economics, business management, accounting and so on, there was never a solid reason as to why we were introduced to such, I guess it was just a matter of passing and moving on to the next grade. My passion for business started growing as I would read newspaper articles about the financial markets, business topics and many other business related news, the internet was a very scarce resource at the point in time so newspapers and magazines covered the platform.
The year went by and we finally wrote our matric exams and we had to wait for the results to come through, at that time I had already decided that it is best I get a University degree and I will resume my other plans at a later stage once I had made my parents proud. In those days I noticed there was an ego kind of behaviour from the math and science learners, they undermined learners in other streams such as Arts, Commerce, History and Geographical studies, Science and Math learners (potential engineers, doctors, scientists) believed somehow they were the gods, that they would be the most successful bunch in history of human existence. Reality had a different package though!
Don’t you ever ask yourself who creates all the programmes you watch every day on television, the movies you watch at the cinema, the music you listen to daily, the clothes you are wearing right now, how about that nice couch you sit on daily? Well at least I know it is the people who studied Arts, Media and Entertainment, and those individuals in those respective industries are amongst the most successful people in today’s time, right? Of course we have very successful doctors and engineers today but that does not give anyone a ticket to disrespect other people just because they did not choose to be a math and science learner.
The day of the matric results came closer as most of the learners waited in agony and kept in touch with one another, I was not nervous since I knew that I had done enough in the exam so that I can go to University and further my studies as told. My parents were anxious as we waited and that started to make me anxious as well and finally the day of the results came and what I remember clearly was waking up early in the morning just around the summer sunrise and jumping into a car with my Father, we drove off to the local mall to purchase a newspaper that publishes the results (another thing done in the education department that I really do not see the logic behind) and as we got there we were greeted by a small organised queue of young anxious people and their parents, we managed to buy the paper and as soon as I opened it I quickly turned to the section containing my school name, I went through the list expecting my name at any moment and there it was right in front of my eyes. I looked at my Father and smiled and he smiled back grabbed the paper and saw his son’s name and he could not hold back the excitement. The old man is very fond of institutionalised education, I knew right at that moment he was very proud to call me his son.
I could not wait to share the news with the rest of the family members, my friends and former high school mates, the excitement settled in and eventually things went back to normal, I began to frustrate about the thought of spending another three years or more sticking my face into huge textbooks, I began to wonder what would be different if my parents would understand my need to not go to University full time so that I can make use of my creativity to flourish and be a successful entrepreneur, I knew very well that being in University would require that I put most of the plans I had in mind on hold and focus on graduating, getting a job and paying tax. I had already applied in two Universities, one in Johannesburg and the other in Pretoria (Tshwane), my Father suggested that I go to Johannesburg and travel every day from home to class but I really needed to be far from everything, be in a place that I could plan how to continue pursuing my dreams.
Both Universities accepted me and I chose the one in Pretoria so that I could get a new start, learn to survive alone and most importantly figure out a way to become someone made out of creativity instead of just becoming a normal career oriented person.
By that time I had to reflect on the high school situation. Friendships broke apart because some of my friends did not make it into University and it became awkward for some reason keeping in touch, some had no plans for the future as like myself most if not all of them suffered the pain of having to give up their creativity for new laborious school methods, methods that did not become fruitful for the majority, no wonder the high unemployment rate because there is only one route in going to school, that is pass your high school with good grades, go to University, graduate and apply for a suitable job.
So what happened to most of those learners who did not achieve good grades for a University entrance, well let’s just say up until today most of them are still figuring a way into getting into University, that is if some are not couch potatoes at home, news reporters at the local street corners, or had to settle for a job that they had never imagined they would work at as math and science worshipers(it has been eight years now), that is time wasted frustrating to get into higher education without a guarantee of employment post-graduation. Education which drained creativity, independence and intelligence of thousands of individuals, education which left a lot of children feeling useless in society and having to settle for remnants, WHY ARE SO MANY PEOPLE FIGHTING TO BE A PART OF THIS SELF DRAINING PRACTICE?
Eight years? What can one do in eight years? Let me tell you in summary what I did in eight years that other people have wasted trying to get into University, I graduated, yay!, I started working, I met my sweetheart, we have a beautiful daughter expecting another new born, I got into financial trouble(the joy of employment), I attended countless business seminars, I learned how to trade the financial markets, I made new networks, some of them with a couple of millions in the bank (inspirational), I started a company which failed, I started another one which might be breaking even soon.
I self-educated myself about real estate (planning to go into real estate eventually), I helped a couple of people find themselves (lost souls somewhere during their schooling and career journeys), I learned the art of hard work, sacrifices, time and financial management and I am now planning to leave my job and go solo, and most importantly in that eight years I am still on track to becoming what I have always wanted to become, A SUCCESSFUL SELF MADE BUSINESS MOGUL,AUTHORANDPHILANTHROPIST
This summarized eight year journey has taught me something very important, that you have to dream and allow yourself to make mistakes, most importantly learn from those mistakes, something that the education system has no room for, mistakes!, I mean the development of a human is as a result of mistakes, from birth learning how to walk until we die we are bound to make mistakes and learn from them, but why does the education system treat mistakes as an abomination, why does the education system think dreamers are losers, everything in life begins with a dream that turns into an idea, that turns into action with lots of mistakes and risks and eventually turns into a success story.
You want to be successful even before you are successful you must learn how to dream and take pride in your dreams, then develop and action strategy to turn your dreams into a reality, people around me know me as the guy who will become the President and Founder of Marweshe Holdings, a multibillion dollar South African conglomerate, a company not even formed but in my mind it is already successful and because of that I work on turning it into a reality every day of my life, because I enjoy what I see in my mind, a life that affords me time to be what I want to be when I want to be it and how I want to be it.
I realised that we spent five years in high school not to add value to the creativity we are born with but to be taught a whole new chapter in life and be prepared for the next level which is University, hence most people who did not make it into University after matric are still struggling to determine what they are capable of until this day, the way in which our minds are programmed makes us highly susceptible to permanent failure. I have always believed that it is the natural behaviour of the mind that if only one part is utilised than it renders the other parts dysfunctional thus going into sleep mode.
The creativity is drained to a point whereby you grow up believing that it takes good grades and nothing else to make it in life, reflecting from previous years there has been children who committed suicide after discovering that they had failed their matric, if the system groomed children into knowing that there is more to life and success than having to be good at math and science then I significantly believe there would be less of such suicidal cases.
Society at large has failed to realise that every individual in life is capable of turning hobbies into fortune, take a good look at, athletes, actors, writers and public speakers in today’s life, look at how those particular individuals have turned everyday hobbies into professional careers with great fortune and at the same time with benefit socially, mentally and health wise.
It is time we as people realise that life was not meant to have a single route to follow because from the beginning it has always been about diversity and independence, a Chinese billionaire once said “if you are thirty five and still poor you deserve it” and as harsh as his words sound, it is a positive statement to those who are willing to achieve something. If you read his words and you interpret them in a negative manner you will label him as an insensitive human, yet if you read them and receive them positively you will stand up and determine what he really meant then make something useful of yourself instead of sitting and crying foul all day long. Reality check is the best remedy for laziness.
- FORGET SCHOOL, TEACH YOURSELF
I was meant to become the President of my own empire, I dropped out from furthering my studies to use that time to self-educate myself, it is easy to prioritise when you have clear written goals, this was my scenario.
- I had a full time job
- I was drifting into entrepreneurship
- I enrolled into University to further my studies.
These three items besides spending time with my family took most of my time and as a result I had to sacrifice one in order to maintain a balanced time system, I did not even break a sweat when I decided to quit furthering my studies and use that time as surplus to becoming an entrepreneur while keeping my day time job, I never stopped going to school though because my new school was attending business seminars, financial literacy seminars and networking with people who are already at heights I wanted to be, just like a passionate employee would rub shoulders with company executives hoping to learn from them as they are in positions he/she aspires to be, I was rubbing shoulders with successful full time business owners, and used their experience as leverage for my developing empire, I did not want money from any of them but I just wanted experience and to learn new relevant things every day, so I did not stop schooling at all, I just quit institutionalised education knowing that when I was wealthy enough not just in terms of money but time as well, I could always go back and get another degree if I found that necessary.
A lot of people including my immediate family questioned my decision to give up institutionalised education, at this point I was responsible for my actions so I did not see a need to worry about what my parents or anybody else thought, I knew that it was all part of my success plan, the thing about life is that not everybody will agree with your decisions because nobody resides inside your thoughts, it is only you who understands your plans and your actions. The best part about having a plan in your life is that you do not even become a victim of peer pressure, I realised this because most of my former University mates, colleagues and friends went back to school and upgraded their qualifications, I was not even bothered or pressured because I knew that furthering my studies was not part of my plan at least at that moment, I noticed that even as adults a lot of people still had no plan in life as some only furthered their qualifications because friends or colleagues were doing so, just so that they remain in the competition loop, at this point in time my diploma was amongst the least ranked qualifications in the working world, I guess my brains were the winning factor because on the job I was a smart idiot.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not advising people to stop schooling, I am merely pointing out that school without a plan will eventually lead to unhappiness, because believe it or not the most successful and happy people in the world are those who wake up every day to engage in daily duties that they are passionate about, be it a career in a government agency, a career in the corporate world, sports, entrepreneurship or even freelancing, that is why Warren Buffet once stated that he always advised college kids to take jobs that they would take if they were independently wealthy, this clearly shows that most people are caught up in daily duties only because they have to survive.
There is a difference between people who live and people who exist, people who live are the ones who wake up with a purpose, pursue their dreams, plan goals and achieve them, these are the people who not only go to school but understand the importance of going to school, these are people who are not subjected to one form of learning but they continue to educate themselves out of institutionalised education, these people are the winners in life, and they know failure writes success, because institutionalised education teaches us to fear failing and make us believe that mistakes are an abomination.
People who exist are those who wake up in the morning only to see the next day, these people drag their feet while hoping the clock ticks down quickly to the end of the day only to be met by a similar day with the same pattern the following day, these people have no ambition, goals, direction and are swimming in a pool of excuses, these are people who are more susceptible to failure.
Some of you might be thinking that I am referring to people who perhaps did not go to school but this is not the case, in fact what I have realised is that the most educated individuals with different degrees fall in this platform, highly qualified individuals working in large corporations and conglomerates fall in this platform, they earn big salaries but they just exist because either then their education and fancy jobs, there is nothing else to life but just that. They work themselves to retirement, fall into bad health and realise that they do not even have enough money to take care of themselves at that age. It is a sad scenario; it is a life of education without a plan in an irrational educational system.
Once again, don’t get me wrong because I am not encouraging an uneducated society but I am encouraging a society that relies more on self-education than on education that grades society into smart and dumb, the intelligence of a human is too great to be measured by a test grading. We are living in an information world were change constantly occurs and the problem with institutionalised education is that it is too out dated and does not keep up with the rate of change happening today, Peter Drucker once stated “When a subject becomes totally obsolete, we make it a required course”. This clearly shows what people are taught in school is outdated information that would not even be useful in the new world, it is information that has already been utilised and has become overshadowed by new modern information that has value.
At University I spent three years being taught mostly about the industrial revolution, the beginning of the industrial age when great minds such as Henry Ford, Toyoda, Shigeo Shingo and many others were at their prime, these great names went on to lay a foundation of the greatness we are witnessing in the 21st century, but what was the point being taught more about methods which have passed their prime and made their fortunes already?
As we were busy being taught about the beginning of the industrial world and the methods claimed to still be applicable in modern manufacturing to date, the likes of Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page and Sergey Brin were becoming billionaires not through what was developed by Henry Ford but through what was the future, these young minds had turned into creative masters and ripped fortunes, they anticipated the future, had a voice of independence and because of that they shifted the industrial age into what we are living in now, that is the information age. This is proof that institutionalised education teaches subjects that are totally obsolete, outdated and of little value.
People might oppose this but in the next five to ten decades learners in schools will be taught about the information age, learners at that time will be taught the strategies used by the likes of Jack Ma and Sergey Brin as daily subjects and unfortunately at that point those strategies will be of little or no value in as much as Henry Ford’s methods to fortune are not easily applicable in the information age.
The educational system is just waiting for the information age strategies to become obsolete and then new literature will be written referring to the then obsolete strategies and learners in that era will be taught based on them, unfortunately at that point there would probably be a major shift in eras, maybe artificial intelligence will be the new hot cake.
During my schooling days I realised that most kids went through loss of self-esteem and confidence because they were made to believe that they are dumb just because they could not meet the requirements of a predetermined exam, how ridiculous! The government and together with citizens should work together to develop a system that does not rely on grading human intelligence to determine the future of a child, we need an educational culture that relies on human intelligence to groom talent and creativity, a culture of critical thinkers, and not people who are programmed from birth to believe that the purpose of life is to be tested in an absurd system and through those results the future of that individual is determined.
I know I am not the first person to criticize the education system, let me quote some of the famous quotes which I do not take any credit for,
Famous Quotes:
“Schools are designed on the assumption that there is a secret to everything in life; that the quality of life depends upon knowing that secret; that secrets can only be known in orderly successions; and that only teachers can properly reveal these secrets. An individual with a schooled mind conceives of the world as a pyramid of classified packages accessible only to those who carry the proper tags.” – Ivan Illich
“Our rapidly moving, information-based society badly needs people who know how to find facts rather than memorize them, and who know how to cope with change in creative ways. You don’t learn those things in school.” –Wendy Priesnitz
“There were no sex classes. No friendship classes. No classes on how to navigate a bureaucracy, build an organization, raise money, create a database, buy a house, love a child, spot a scam, talk someone out of suicide, or figure out what was important to me. Not knowing how to do these things is what messes people up in life, not whether they know algebra or can analyse literature.” – William Upski Wimsatt
“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing that it is stupid.” – Albert Einstein
“Education itself is a putting off, a postponement; we are told to work hard to get good results. Why? So we can get a good job. What is a good job? one that pays well? Oh. And that’s it? All this suffering, merely so that we can earn a lot of money, which, even if we manage it, will not solve our problems anyway? It’s a tragically limited idea of what life is all about.” – Tom Hodgkinson
“The whole educational and professional training system is a very elaborate filter, which just weeds out people who are too independent, and who think for themselves, and who don’t know how to be submissive, and so on – because they’re dysfunctional to the institutions.” – Noam Chomsky
“The anxiety children feel at constantly being tested, their fear of failure, punishment, and disgrace, severely reduces their ability both to perceive and to remember, and drives them away from the material being studied into strategies for fooling teachers into thinking they know what they really don’t know.” – John Caldwell Holt
“Traditional education focuses on teaching, not learning. It incorrectly assumes that for every ounce of teaching there is an ounce of learning by those who are taught. However, most of what we learn before, during, and after attending schools is learned without it being taught to us. A child learns such fundamental things as how to walk, talk, eat, and dress, and so on without being taught these things. Adults learn most of what they use at work or at leisure while at work or leisure. Most of what is taught in classroom settings are forgotten, and much or what is remembered is irrelevant.” – Russell Ackoff
“Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is.” –Isaac Asimov
“I am concerned that too many people are focused too much on money and not on their greatest wealth, which is their education. If people are prepared to be flexible, keep an open mind and learn, they will grow richer and richer through the changes. If they think money will solve the problems, I am afraid those people will have a rough ride. Intelligence solves problems and produces money. Money without financial intelligence is money soon gone.” – Robert Kiyosaki
The above mentioned quotes are only a few of the many great quotes we have today from such great men and women, reflecting on the last quote by Robert Kiyosaki when he says and I quote “money without financial intelligence is money soon gone”, if you have never been employed, with a payslip you might find it hard to understand what he is talking about, to most of you there is a believe that being highly educated from the classroom automatically gives you the financial head start required when you start working, well think again because even the highest qualified accountants in today’s economy are struggling financially, those who are not struggling are living way below their means all in the name of being savvy.
Why is emphasis not placed on the most important things rather than on useless equations that amount to nothing when a person enters the real world, for example, you only start understanding the taxation impact on your life once you start working, that is what happens when you spend five years being taught how to draw a rhombus, parallelogram and hexagon when you should be taught about the taxation laws and its impact in your life, be taught how to develop a professional long term financial plan, unfortunately these are things only a few people learn through self-education while the rest hide in embarrassment and struggle their way to death.
People have to take advantage of the countless opportunities that are presented to us in today’s times, scholars have to not only read prescribed textbooks, they have to start reading books that talk about other subjects of interests in life i.e. technology, science, tax laws, goal planning, leadership and coaching, financial intelligence, psychology and most importantly pick up one or two self-help books on a monthly basis to continue enhancing their creativity.
Everybody is born with some sort of talent and such talents need to be natured with hard work, persistence, determination, discipline and proper decision making in order for more people to be successful in life with or without a University degree. Talents are a special gift and reprogramming people to follow one suite in life destroys the people’s God given gifts, however people must realise that talent is overrated, how so? If talent is not backed up by hard work, persistence, determination, discipline and decision making then it is as good as obsolete.
Cristiano Ronaldo a very prolific soccer player is a great example why talent can be overrated, he was born with passion for soccer and wanted to succeed and become a legend, had he just continued playing soccer because of talent he would not be what he is today, he focused more on refining his talent by working hard, staying focused, learning new tricks and mastering them, remaining disciplined and most importantly he never stopped loving what he did, none of what he did required him to know integration or geometry, and today he is one of the wealthiest sportsmen in the world, he is an inspiration to young kids.
Had his parents decided to force him to stay in school and focus on getting good grades and a University entrance then there would be no Cristiano Ronaldo today, he would probably be stuck behind an office desk and typing meaningless reports on Microsoft word the whole day, sad and disillusioned with his career, we would never have experienced the greatest moments of soccer in this generation, institutionalised education would have taken that special moment away from us. We can’t all be Cristiano Ronaldo but we can all be our own Cristiano Ronaldo.
What about Henry Ford, Michael Dell, Aliko Dangote, Samuel Eto’o, George Best, Jack Ma, Lionel Messi, Lira, Folorunsho Alakija and many other people who shaped the world through creativity and talent, what would have happened if they all decided to get good grades, go to University and get a secure job with a firm income? What would be happening to those who rely on these great minds to make a living? Shouldn’t we learn from these people that we should not use tests and grading as a measure of success and intelligence? Self-education remains the only key to modern day freedom.
Have you ever heard this famous quote? “If I am not going to Columbia University, I am going to Columbia Records and you don’t need a high school diploma over there” these were words said by six time Grammy Award winner Billy Joel after he found out that he won’t be graduating in 1967 after failing his high school. He went on to sell over 150 million copies worldwide and has an estimated $160 million net worth, the rest is history.
I discovered during the journey I am currently walking that what we learn at school is either outdated, forgotten or dead root even when we remember it, today we have thousands of young people who have no future or so they believe because they failed to memorise subjects at school, because looking at it the education system is not a measure of intelligence but a measure of the memory. The young people currently sitting and hoping for manna to fall from heaven need to realise that a person’s future can never be determined by a grading paper, destiny is like luck, it does not exist until you create it yourself.
I have spent my life listening to people talking of how unlucky they are as compared to their peers who managed to get financial support to attend university and graduate with a degree, to get a high paying job, or how unlucky they are when compared to their peers who were lucky enough to get jobs at a young age or get a business contract so forth and so on.
Unfortunately what a lot of people do not realise is that luck exists not until you create luck yourself, have you heard how people give a testimony in church? They will go like this “For five years I was struggling to get a tender for my company, my applications were rejected at the first glance, it was not until I came to the pastor, confessed and tithed that my luck turned around and God awarded me with a multimillion rand tender”, in the mind of the congregation they now process this testimony as luck, what happens from there is you have everybody tithing and confessing for a turnaround of luck, what the testifier does not tell the congregation is that he was not relaxed and procrastinating during the time that he was applying for all the tenders, he fails to tell the congregation that even with all the rejection he did not stop having faith in his business, he kept on persisting, he was determined and most probably spent hours of sleepless nights refining his proposal and learning from his mistakes.
What his confession does in return is it makes the congregation believe he was lucky and nothing else, that God’s favour was on his side, what the congregation fails to understand is this man never stopped working no matter how many times he was rejected.
What will happen to those who start tithing and confessing without hard work towards their dreams, those who fail to plan, what will happen to them? In most evidence their luck will never turn around because there is nothing value adding they are doing. This just goes to show that even if you do bad in school it does not mean you have bad luck, it just goes to show that you must shift your expectations, reshape your destiny and plan your goals, write them down and spend every day adding value in your life. Question is how do you make the turnaround?
Quite possibly I have never had too much hope in institutionalised education, although I had a great memory which helped me progress year after year, I did not in any way relate my destiny with classroom qualifications. To answer the question of how does one make a turnaround? After completing my studies I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur, I did not know where to start like everybody else, I was confused and undermining myself, I had big dreams ( I still do), but my dreams scared me, they scared me because the current capacity of achieving them was very minimal, I doubted my ability, I was filled with fear, there was no hope for a better future because being stuck in a job for 45 years was not something I had planned, but the more fear I developed the more comfortable I became in the current situation.
Book By Tumelo Liondancer Marweshe
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