BEING SERIOUS AND RIGOROUS
A burning candle sheds many insights, if it is patiently, carefully, observed.
The same is true for anything else.
This understanding was introduced by the first assignment in 10th grade chemistry class. At first, I had briefly looked at it; scribbled down several things and returned to class the next day. Talk about being embarrassed!
Classmates had dozens of insights. I had less than a dozen! The teacher asked us to pass them to him. More embarrassed than ever, now, was I , since my woe was generally known.
He made me repeat the experience, which was really a first "experiment."
This time, more seriously, I derived literally hundreds of observations. He accepted the work without feedback.
I passed chemistry barely. To this day, I wonder if I would have fared better under a different instructor ?
In reality, I had taken chemistry to avoid physics, in fulfillment of the science requirements to graduate .
Avoiding physics was to avoid my having to study calculus, or more mathematics, which was rigorous!
Ah, rigorous! We have come to the die, the severer, the discriminator!
It is rigor!
Somehow, somewhere, sometimes, I had acquired an affinity to "get over," rather than to exert a serious effort: to get a lot from the least, to slide by.
This lamentable habit was not merely limited to me, but was one borne by my friends, as well as by people that I knew. But, It is the rigorous pursuit of "perfection" that elevates the cream from the milk, from hard churning, as, in process, its butter from the cream.
Pestle and mortar rigor yields grain.
Lack of rigor will embarrass you, as it did me, and others, later, repeatedly.
The fault lies not within our stars, but within ourselves, Shakespeare wrote.
https://www.enotes.com/shakespeare-quotes/fault-dear-brutus-our-stars
Be rigorous! Get serious about life!
Sunday, March 19, 2017
BE SERIOUS RIGOROUS
BEING SERIOUS AND RIGOROUS
A burning candle sheds many insights, if it is patiently, carefully, observed.
The same is true for anything else.
This understanding was introduced by the first assignment in 10th grade chemistry class. At first, I had briefly looked at it; scribbled down several things and returned to class the next day. Talk about being embarrassed!
Classmates had dozens of insights. I had less than a dozen! The teacher asked us to pass them to him. More embarrassed than ever, now, was I , since my woe was generally known.
He made me repeat the experience, which was really a first "experiment."
This time, more seriously, I derived literally hundreds of observations. He accepted the work without feedback.
I passed chemistry barely. To this day, I wonder if I would have fared better under a different instructor ?
In reality, I had taken chemistry to avoid physics, in fulfillment of the science requirements to graduate .
Avoiding physics was to avoid my having to study calculus, or more mathematics, which was rigorous!
Ah, rigorous! We have come to the die, the severer, the discriminator!
It is rigor!
Somehow, somewhere, sometimes, I had acquired an affinity to "get over," rather than to exert a serious effort: to get a lot from the least, to slide by.
This lamentable habit was not merely limited to me, but was one borne by my friends, as well as by people that I knew. But, It is the rigorous pursuit of "perfection" that elevates the cream from the milk, from hard churning, as, in process, its butter from the cream.
Pestle and mortar rigor yields grain.
Lack of rigor will embarrass you, as it did me, and others, later, repeatedly.
The fault lies not within our stars, but within ourselves, Shakespeare wrote.
https://www.enotes.com/shakespeare-quotes/fault-dear-brutus-our-stars
Be rigorous! Get serious about life!