Boost Your Brain for Independence, Imagination and Fun of Learning

02 May Boost Your Brain for Independence, Imagination and Fun of Learning

Posted at 14:49h in Blog, Ruth's Reflections by

Imagine launching your own balloons (photo of Angie Fregoso by her sister Maria)

NEW DRAFT AS OF 4/30/25 for comment and improvement suggestions

Boost Your Brain for Independence, Imagination and Fun of Learning

By Ruth Schimel PhD, Career & Life Management Consultant, Author

© 2025, www.ruthschimel.com ruth@ruthschimel.com 202.659.1772 for permissions to use

Good news about continuous opportunities in your future. The timing and design for your learning and education are no longer as rigid and linear. You therefore have agency for making better matches to support your own independence and imagination. In the process, you can boost your brain as you choose authentically among dynamic options of how, when, where and why you want future directions. Use this article to explore and decide how you will dive in and have fun doing it.

Relate your choices to current and future work or not. (Considerations and timing for your work life design: https://acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:sc:us:29def5d4-1705-451c-a6e1-679bd276d7e3)

Given extended life and health spans, keeping your brain vibrant through learning and education is all the more important. Flexible options permit accommodation for differing ages, backgrounds, capacities, interests and experience. Starting with what works for and appeals to you, explore dual-enrollments and flexible learning programs online. For the intriguing ones, have conversations with representatives of programs and processes, conventional as well as experimental. You could find unanticipated bridges and even invitations to content and processes with meaning to you. https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=flexible+learning+programs.

See how technology contributes to a range of options with variety in the classroom, online MOOCs and applied practices. Topics and focus may be academic or vocational or combinations. Note that the word vocation means calling, something you are meant to do, but some consider it less prestigious or even disdain it as “mere” trade. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_open_online_course

Are these possibilities too good to be true or possibly overwhelming? The challenge embedded in them is to commit to appreciating and understanding yourself while you’re in motion, whatever your aims and interests, skills and passions.

For flexibility and access to a variety of possibilities, transferable or soft skills are likely more important than content skills which are more likely subject to change. In today’s dynamic climate especially even experts need to keep updating their subject matter or content skills. Examples of transferable skills are communication, problem-solving, leadership, time management, adaptability, teamwork, and critical thinking. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/04/know-yourself-socrates/682458/?gift=FR3rssR25uKQNG9GZXk0xh96xAKBxkOnZqxIDqMR7Us&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

Over time, being open to new ideas about what you want to do and why will also help avoid hobbling yourself with known or merely comfortable assumptions and sequences. Ways to do this include cultivating mutual assistance with peers and colleagues as well as productive, engaging relationships with providers of learning contribute to enjoyment and progress. As you notice the having-to mentality giving way to wanting-to do something, you’ll know you’re moving forward well.

Your interest in learning and education has at least two motivations, often interacting: preparation and credibility for work and self-sufficiency and wish to build and express your unique, full potential, lifelong. This article will help you explore both and expand your thinking about them, whatever your confidence levels, ambitions, motivations and situation. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/04/higher-education-happiness/682540/?gift=FR3rssR25uKQNG9GZXk0xkarznK_UqoBtg9tnt2CmRE&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

Where are you now? Are you considering or doing self-study, layered certifications or combining them with degrees, possibly to match interdisciplinary interests and aims? Perhaps you’re one of the approximately 37 million Americans who have some college but no degree yet.

Maybe you’ve obtained credentials and experience for work that no longer engages you or is overtaken by technological change. Or you could be part of the sandwich generation, caring for children and older parents, missing the luxury of considering your own needs and dreams first.

Do circumstances force you to move on, or better, forward? In addition to timing, there are the challenges of costs, accessibility and transportation. More basically, you may not have a very clear idea of what you want to learn – or unlearn.

To me, effective education and learning involve flexible tools and processes, self-knowledge and experience that attend to and honor your originality and purposes, insofar as possible. Finding fun is more likely when you’re exploring or learning what intrigues you with energetic, curious people with whom you often cross-fertilize. Such likeable, fruitful people can include librarians, fellow learners, and teachers/professors who make material come alive. Wherever you are, though, at least stay alert to what will provide meaning and purpose for the unrenewable time you have left.

Background sources:

My nonlinear odyssey, briefly. For ideas for action or adaptation, I share the following. As a curious person, I enjoy learning and “following my nose” with eclectic sources, when I’m not being lazy. As an incremental learner and full-time worker, I was a student for decades and teacher/professor in several universities. I was also a slow mover, taking over 20 years, including gaps, to complete my master’s and doctoral degrees.

For my master’s degree, I had negotiated acceptance because my undergraduate C+ grades were too low. After being rejected, I made an appointment with the George Washington University graduate admissions representative to chat about possibilities. I proposed if I did well on my graduate record exam (GRE), took two graduate courses at night and got As, would she reconsider me?

That negotiation worked out and I continued with a new plan to do better than the C+ average I had from Cornell. To do that, I mostly took courses that had meaning for me, wrote papers that related to my true interests and chose and got to know professors I respected and enjoyed.

I had fun most of the time in part because I created a manageable rhythm of one course a term while working full time, eventually graduating with honors. Being increasingly clear, most of the time, about what I wanted to do and why also helped.

For your information, graduate course grades were pretty inflated; getting As was no biggie. I also think that I was more mature and better motivated because I could often manage and choose the content and process of my education.

My two independent-minded and original parents provided good role models. A former electrical engineer sidelined by the Depression, my Pop found work as a vocational and technical high school teacher in the south Bronx. Some time later, we all “went” to Cornell for his master’s in education over two summers.

My mother kept learning while she was working, finally finishing at 50 after about 30 years from start to finish. Graduating with honors, Mom requested an assignment as a junior high school teacher in Harlem, New York City.

She even got permission to bring me occasionally to some of her courses. Feeling very grown up and delighted by new ways of learning and thinking, one of my best family memories was going to college night school classes with my mother when I was in high school.

I’ve also learned from my consulting experiences as I guided my career and life management clients over the decades. They have often charted their original as well as traditional paths with my assistance as well as with their own intuition and investigations.

How to start your launch. You can learn from relatives, friends, colleagues and leaders. Choose inspiring role models you know, adopt, observe, read about. Sometimes even negative role models teach you what to avoid. For example, when I asked my mother how she became such a good one, she said she learned what not to be and do from her own mother.

Invest in cultivating inspiring mentors and acknowledge their attention as appropriate. Be honest with yourself about your priorities and what’s possible. In the process be kind as well as tough with yourself. Attend well to what inspires you and why. Keep vibrant your sense of humor about yourself and situation along with your intuition and curiosity.

Preliminary ideas for your process. It not already done, consider layering certifications, undergraduate and subsequent degrees. Other preparation can include self-study and choosing options in succession or in discontinuous ways.

As you know, sometimes unfolding what you want, how to work it out, and marshaling resources takes a while. Establishing viable rhythms also takes time as situations and people who influence it change around you. There is no one best way, except possibilities that make sense for you and challenge your unique capacities to continue blossoming.

As an introduction, I hope the following two excursions into respected, encouraging and expanding ideas about learning will support your inclinations and ideas. Take what’s useful and leave the rest. Later I’ll return to specific steps you can take for clarifying focus and purpose as well as ways to boost your brain.

Two “old” learning approaches support my suggestions to you. Following are two long-established guiding ideas to help you organize thinking and action. They are scientist and novelist C.P. Snow’s two-culture tension between science and the humanities and philosopher, educator and psychologist John Dewey’s philosophy of learning.

Snow posited in 1959 that science, and the humanities represent “the intellectual life of the whole of western society.” Dividing these two cultures is a major handicap to both in solving the world’s problems.

John Dewey’s philosophies of education has roots in pragmatism, emphasizing experiential learning, critical thinking, and social engagement. The perspective aims to cultivate thoughtful, reflective, and active citizens who can contribute meaningfully to a democratic society.

Dewey advocated for student-centered experiential “learning by doing” related to real-world problem solving and social engagement. Instead of linear and hierarchical learning in static classroom settings, he stressed teacher facilitation of collaboration and student discovery of knowledge through problem solving.

He also thought that education should be relevant to students’ lives and prepare them for active participation in society, rather than simply for future jobs. Given his interest in cultivating individuality, you can imagine he would avoid silos and rigid titles as well as encourage originality.

In today’s world, Snow’s perspective straddles the cusp of modern complexity. It provides opportunities for interdisciplinary thinking and action, better related to the complexity of current and future situations. Instead of juxtaposing the two cultures or any other combination with OR, plumb the creative possibilities that emerge when you place AND between seemingly conflicted elements. What fresh thinking and action choices show up when you imagine a science enriched by perspectives of the humanities.

One example might be one which uses original art and a well-prompted AI text describing a science situation; it could stimulate the curiosity of people with differing educations, experiences and vocabularies. An example by two accomplished people in an ongoing relationship over time is this one integrating original art with theoretical physics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sX3DxwFxjx8 For their conversation and collaboration, watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Myuq3PRDE6M.

Translate these theories to personal experience and choices. I encourage you to consider whatever aspects of Snow’s and Dewey’s perspectives and suggestions that appeal to you as you keep developing your own preferences and plans for action, now and later. My own experiences as well as those of my clients and family support aspects and the expansive opportunities presented by both men. Whether formal or informal, you can have your own private and small group learning adventures with varied timing.

After many years my mother finally received her bachelor’s degree at age 50 while working full time. Then, she became a teacher in Harlem, New York City, by choice. Her process only took 30 discontinuous years (with “time-out” for motherhood and other work) from start to completion! At 41, m1y father, an electrical engineer, returned for his master’s degree in education to enrich his teaching in a South Bronx vocational and technical high school. He did it with the whole family present during two summers at Cornell.

Wherever you are in your learning experiences, be alert for ways to have fun as you define it. Express your own ideas and goals that have authentic meaning and purpose as well as viability! Create a healthy rhythm that fits the rest of your goals and commitments.

Your strategies. Avoid measuring your unique self or situation against what others do. Instead, adapt and use this article to clarify what’s important to you about learning in ways that free your true capacities and honor purposes and interests that appeal to you. They are bound to evolve and change as you mature further, whatever your chronological age. Short purpose questions 2025.docx

In fact, there seem to be lost opportunities when many vital choices are made so early in life before there’s clarity to ourselves about who we truly are and what we want. Thank goodness, lengthening life and health spans provide opportunities to make more thoughtful, authentic decisions along the way. This is especially important given the dynamic family, work and health situations that influence preferences and self-sufficiency over time.

However, when you’ve had the chance to specify what you want to learn and study, often you are not fully in charge of how to do it. Nor are you able to express in your own way what you’ve accomplished through testing, writing, demonstration or other means. That’s because much of that process operates in traditional or conventional formats. Then, adapt it to your own needs, as possible, and enlist collaborators for utilizing such improvements.

If you have fun at any point throughout the traditional learning process, it’s probably due to fine teaching processes, excellent curricula design and enjoyable peers and worthwhile projects – and especially your own planning, good choices, imagination and commitment which are relevant in any situation.

Use your previous positive experiences as templates for approximating the worth and fun in subsequent learning situations and negative ones as lessons for what to avoid. Identify partners in learning and mentors who will encourage you and ask tough, important questions. Of course, pose similar questions to yourself!

But if you’re suffering from FOMO (fear of missing out) about something that would not even be a good match, remind yourself it’s probably not the event you’re missing. It could be the bonding. https://theconversation.com/feeling-fomo-for-something-thats-not-even-fun-its-not-the-event-youre-missing-its-the-bonding-247047

Seek situations that serve your interests and purposes rather than merely conforming to others’ demands, values or assumptions. Conforming, in itself, can lead you to unsatisfying, time-eating detours. Instead, explore the often-wider range of available choices or develop your own ideas. For example, consider work in the trades where current salaries compete well with those for college graduates with bachelor’s degrees. Investigate a range of options and their intrinsic satisfactions. “Author Matthew Crawford presents a shining yet unsentimental anthem for work in the trades: physical, creative labor.” https://www.mortiseandtenonmag.com/products/shop-class-as-soulcraft-an-inquiry-into-the-value-of-work?srsltid=AfmBOop4PeN69sDsDHADpIoObRp8W34J1tlSt6oCv8nx_FDUFyNHmcWh

If not already aware of ways to satisfy conventional requirements, look into informal community group experiences, practicums and negotiated course credit arrangements for experience. Choose rhythms that work for you, designing your own choices at any age.

For example, I got my master’s degree in my late thirties and, even more slowly, my PhD at 50, most of it while working full-time. If you don’t find a good match in what’s offered, consider negotiating for something closer to what you want. Good relationships with people providing services and opportunities along with your own relatively clear focus all facilitate this process.

For other examples of shifts in our learning processes and promising sources, explore:

So, to suit yourself, you can adapt, choose or move away from the traditional passive and often reactive learning process that takes away both the onus and opportunity to design and assess what you’ve learned. Take some time to imagine and explore what would happen if you were in charge of the process.

As someone who wanted that responsibility in varying degrees, the further I went with my education, including formal and informal learning, the more challenging, and mostly worthwhile. While I did not find my independence magical or always efficient, it gave me greater chances for enjoyment along with doing the work, as I boosted my brain in the adventures.

For me, fun was discovering interesting, useful, surprising, new information and ways to deepen and enrich work and playful experiences — especially ways to combine the two. I connected with a variety of people of differing ages and backgrounds who were stimulating. My mature relationships with many of my professors were responsible escapes from hierarchy and silos. Varied learning experiences and conversations often brought and opened better insights that deepened my life and understanding as well as provided fresh ways to contribute.

Some of the fun came with unplanned surprises, also known as synchronicity. They seemed to appear the closer I came to following my heart and being authentic during the process. One personal example was the actual vision I got for my dissertation topic (story later) when I was joined a group where I did not “belong” out of curiosity.

Take a few minutes now and jot down a few, specific ideas about what would be fun for you as it relates to learning and education.

Ways that may help you continue boosting your brain and having fun learning, formally and informally

Start within yourself where you have the most say.

  1. Erase, modify or briefly write, as catharsis, about any negative associations, emotions or experiences that would block your learning. Discuss it with others and get assistance as needed. Example: I found mutual aid when I got help with my longstanding math block in exchange for guiding a friend with her challenges about organizational theory. (We both got As in our courses.)
  2. Pay attention to topics.processes and interests you have, however seemingly impractical or or inaccessible. Instead, be alert for patterns and inter-relationships. Avoid rigid titles and labels, as you briefly describe your interests in writing. What are the continuing themes and issues about which you wonder why?
  3. Imagine what your life would be like if you maintained, more or less, the consistency, vision and pep to keep at something you wanted or hoped to continue enjoying. Revisit a range of such experiences in your mind such as relationships, community, sports and the arts. Talk with others about your and their ideas. https://www.wsj.com/health/wellness/how-your-midlife-eating-habits-can-help-you-live-longer-and-healthier-63242269?st=4tDQSY&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
  4. Identify, reach out to and nurture collaborators you enjoy for preliminary digging around, mutual exploring and benefit.
  5. Barter mutual assistance for sustaining patience and getting minimum necessary resources. Strengthen your sense of humor about yourself, others and situations. Be kind and patient with yourself as you continue any viable adventure that has meaning and attracts you.

Example of serious, deep fun in collaboration on complexity: art, poetry and cosmology (one hour discussion and demonstration): The Warp of the Universe https://www.youtube.com/watc?v=Myuq3PRDE6M

Example of using dance to boost engagement, understanding and learning from physics to math, this dance teacher shows how to incorporate movement to increase student engagement and understanding. https://www.edweek.org/leadership/video-teachers-try-this-use-dance-to-boost-engagement-and-learning/2025/02

Example of using art to deepen self-understanding, interpretation, observation and communication: https://artingconversations.com

Boosting your brain comes from bolts from the blue as well as exploring and learning processes themselves

Even if you get a bolt from blue as I did about my topic on how individuals can define and express their courage, there can be long slogs before and afterwards. Yet, it’s the process itself to appreciate and enjoy rather than focus on the end results that end in a flash anyway.

What will keep you going is an inspiration that’s authentic, stimulating, useful and fun most of the time. Talking about it with others not only keeps you on track but also jiggles your conscience and generates new ideas, processes and possible collaborations.

If you’re curious about what bolted me out of being stuck toward the end of my PhD, here’s the story: I had been procrastinating about my dissertation topic for several years. All I knew was that I wanted to avoid a soulless academic subject that was overfocused on a “manageable” topic of little use to many others.

One day, I decided to attend a doctoral students’ discussion somewhat outside my area of formal study, organizational development (OD). Most everyone was talking about how much they and others knew about improving organizational effectiveness. I was getting impatient because I knew from my consulting and work experience that the process was expensive, time-consuming and problematic. It was fraught with implementation issues because of conflict avoidance and often the unwillingness of the management initiators to take risks for positive modification or change that would diminish or put their power and control in jeopardy.

Suddenly, I saw an image in my mind: a movie marquee with yellow klieg lights around the edge and large, clear letters in red. They spelled COURAGE. Inspired by the vision, I jumped up and gave a mini-speech ending with something like: “If we know so much about OD, how come organizations are so ineffective? I think it’s because the leaders lack courage to implement what we think we know.”

Somewhat surprised at my own passion and frankness, I sat down abruptly. Since I was sitting next to the head of the doctoral program, I whispered to him: “That’s what I want to do my dissertation on, courage.”

Certainly, that showed some temerity. Yet, I soon had the chance to do some applied research when that very professor started writing about courage and kept spinning wheels whenever we met to discuss “my” topic. As time passed without concrete outcomes from the discussions, it became clear to me he was sabotaging my process and progress, perhaps for his own benefit.

Feeling I was on solid ground, I diplomatically asked him to leave my doctoral committee. What gave me some confidence was my excellent relationships with many other professors from over the long years fulfilling course requirements and procrastinating about my PhD. They were around my age and shared my values. I also discussed the problem with a few of them and lined up in advance one caring, capable man to replace the “fired” head of the doctoral program.

You may imagine that the range of emotions and strategies involved with these processes were brain and other boosters, as well as occasionally anxiety producing. But each step gave me greater confidence, not to mention courage.

I remain proud of my straightforward, accessible definition of how most anyone can access and express their capacity for courage. Based on my research, “Courage is a process of becoming that involves the willingness to realize your true capacities by going through discomfort, anxiety, fear or suffering and taking wholehearted, responsible action.”

Opportunities for you to further nurture yourself and create ways to continue learning about something that has meaning to you

Given my interdisciplinary approach to learning, I’m stealing from tarot images at this spring equinox. What is your gate, lock and key? “The Gate reflects an invitation. The Lock is a blocker that we must work through. And the Key, customized to your astrological element, is how you might move forward in opening the Gate.” (From Hyperallergic’s newsletter: Art Tarotscope for the Spring Equinox.)

If you disdain tarot, imagine it as a metaphoric adventure using imaginative associations during these times of uncertainty. Of course, you can take any part of the following that’s useful and leave the rest. Adaptation is also up to you.

For the Gates, what invites you to explore anew, deeper or for the first time? Consider these questions and where they may lead you:

  1. What issues, problems and subjects, and their interactions, intrigue you?
  2. What situations, behaviors or goals frustrate you or make you angry?
  3. What main choices in your life would you make differently? How would you do them better now? What primary thoughts and insights emerge from this brief conversation with yourself that will help steer you better in the future?
  4. Who do you admire? What specific several qualities explain why? What two or three characteristics would you like to emulate? How would you go about developing and expressing one of them?
  5. What gives you pleasure to explore and learn? If nothing comes to mind, mention main reasons why you may be at a loss. For the pleasures, mention specifically why you feel that way. Your responses will give some useful insights and leads for action.

Example of a nonlinear process: https://www.nextavenue.org/painting-with-paper-second-act-artist/ Listen for the themes in others’ stories of searching and how they may relate, enrich you. Link for questions and process for finding your purpose based on an AI query:

For ways to integrate your responses about topics, skills, colleagues, recipients of your services and processes into a specific, personalized description of what you want to do, consider and work with chapter five of my book, https://www.ruthschimel.com/books/happiness-and-joy-in-work/)

For the Locks:

  1. What keeps you from opening the Gate and why?
  2. What resources will you develop to open the gate, including amounts of time, needed knowledge/understanding, topics and ways to develop or get them? What would be fun for you?
  3. What main limitations, fear or anxiety distract you from proceeding? How will you mitigate any major block?

For the Keys:

  1. Who will be your one or two partners for progress?
  2. What nuggets from John Dewey’s ideas about learning by doing lead to your effective planning and action? How will you integrate main aspects from what you’ve gleaned from Snow and Dewey?
  3. How will you invoke your sense of humor and kindness for yourself?
  4. What timing guardrails will you give yourself to sustain action?
  5. How will you reward yourself for and celebrate any progress.

The longer you postpone your worthwhile, creative adventure in learning and growing, the more nonrenewable time is lost. In addition, the eventual pleasure of birthing your own experience and product, with its creative surprises and benefits, is postponed. https://bookshop.org/p/books/sparking-creativity-how-play-and-humor-fuel-innovation-and-design-barry-kudrowitz/18957184?ean=9781032232157&next=t

As the Ikea effect teaches, no matter the prestige and value of what you ultimately choose to learn and do, the effort and personal investment involved in the creation process lead to a stronger sense of ownership and attachment to the product. Given that commitment, the experience is more likely to be worthwhile and enjoyable as well as successful, however you define that. In sum, you are the foundation of the process because that’s where your power, immediate resources and insight are. BTW, I don’t think we manage time, we manage ourselves. https://www.npr.org/2021/10/16/1045396983/time-management-tips-oliver-burkeman

Today’s constantly changing, and sometimes overwhelming situations require both authentic and artificial communication processes. They often bring new challenges to learning and self-expression, whether by choice or not. Conventional learning motivated for practical purposes alone related to work, credentialing and credibility can also add heavy and distracting obligations. In contrast, following your curiosity may be the most fun, creative and productive.

If any of this applies to you, identify how to benefit from the challenges or narrow silos and let go of fighting what you can’t control or influence. Insofar as possible, design rhythms of activity that work well for you; get assistance and support as needed. Remember to acknowledge any progress and reward yourself in healthy ways that have meaning to you.

How learning contributes to boosting your brain. Learning has physical rewards too. It’s crucial for brain health and function, promoting neuroplasticity, strengthening neural pathways, and enhancing cognitive functions. Ultimately, it helps maintain cognitive abilities and potentially delays cognitive decline.

From an AI search, here’s a more detailed explanation of the benefits of learning for boosting your brain:

  1. Neuroplasticity and Brain Changes:

    • Neuroplasticity: Learning new things, skills, or information leads to changes in the brain’s structure and function, a process called neuroplasticity
    • New Connections: Learning creates new connections (synapses) between neurons, strengthening existing pathways and forming new ones.
    • Brain Remodeling: These changes can involve the growth of new neurons (neurogenesis) and the strengthening of existing ones, leading to a more resilient and adaptable brain.
  2. Cognitive Benefits:

    • Enhanced Cognitive Functions: Learning engages and strengthens various cognitive functions, including memory, attention, problem-solving, and critical thinking
    • Improved Memory: Learning new information and skills requires memory encoding and retrieval, which strengthen memory processes.
    • Better Attention and Focus: Engaging in challenging learning activities can improve attention span and focus, as the brain is constantly processing new information.
    • Increased Creativity: Learning new things can spark creativity and innovation by exposing individuals to new ideas and perspectives.
  3. Protection Against Cognitive Decline:

    • Cognitive Reserve: Lifelong learning can build up a “cognitive reserve,” which is a brain’s ability to withstand damage and maintain function despite age-related changes or diseases.
    • Reduced Risk of Dementia: Studies suggest that individuals who engage in continuous learning and mental stimulation may have a reduced risk of developing dementia or cognitive decline.
    • Brain Health: Learning keeps the brain active and engaged, which is essential for maintaining brain health and function as we age.

For more on staying sharp as you age, read A Guide to Cognitive Fitness, a Special Health Report from Harvard Medical School. Green tea benefits: https://bit.ly/4jpbPw6

As a postscript: philosopher and logician Bertrand Russell’s message to future humans. Adapt the following to your own preferences, interests and needs.

“I should like to say two things, one intellectual and one moral. The intellectual thing I should want to say is this: When you are studying any matter, or considering any philosophy, ask yourself only what are the facts and what is the truth that the facts bear out. Never let yourself be diverted either by what you wish to believe, or by what you think would have beneficent social effects if it were believed. But look only, and solely, at what are the facts. That is the intellectual thing that I should wish to say.

The moral thing I should wish to say… I should say love is wise, hatred is foolish. In this world which is getting more closely and closely interconnected we have to learn to tolerate each other, We have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things that we don’t like. We can only live together in that way and if we are to live together and not die together we must learn a kind of charity and a kind of tolerance which is absolutely vital to the continuation of human life on this planet.”

Your main ideas and timing for your own learning, brain boosting and fun are:

In what main specific ways will you foster your independence and imagination:

For alternative ways to embark on your development and growth, I hope you find inspiration from this poem by William Wordsworth. Also try and AND rather than OR:

The Tables Turned

Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books; Or surely you’ll grow double: Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks; Why all this toil and trouble?

The sun above the mountain’s head, A freshening lustre mellow Through all the long green fields has spread, His first sweet evening yellow.

Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife: Come, hear the woodland linnet, How sweet his music! on my life, There’s more of wisdom in it

And hark! how blithe the throstle sings! He, too, is no mean preacher: Come forth into the light of things, Let Nature be your teacher.

She has a world of ready wealth, Our minds and hearts to bless— Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health, Truth breathed by cheerfulness.

One impulse from a vernal wood May teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the sages can.

Sweet is the lore which Nature brings; Our meddling intellect Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:— We murder to dissect.

Enough of Science and of Art; Close up those barren leaves; Come forth, and bring with you a heart That watches and receives.

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