Quest

Eugene S. Wilson: "Only the curious will learn and only the resolute
overcome the obstacles to learning. The quest quotient has always
excited me more than the intelligence quotient."

This brought to mind the many folks I've been exposed to in my short
time here on Planet Earth, and how some seem "bright" while others
are, well, less so. I can't help but wonder why that is. So I asked
myself: Why do I learn?

I learn, typically, because I /want/ to. Why do I want to? I'm
curious. I like the rush of adrenaline at times when knowledge is
absorbed into my brain like a sponge. I enjoy the sensation of it
scrambling along whatever paths it's treading on as it reaches the
little memory cells. I love reading something and simply
understanding it, drawing conclusions of my own, wiping them out with
new ones as I learn more, figuring things out, acquiring new tools to
figure more things out on my own. I like thinking. I take my head
with me everywhere I go, so it's a wonderful toy to have around at
all times. I'm never bored. So learning, for me, gives me plenty to
do.

I also learn because I'm required to. The problem with that is that
I don't remember as well when I'm not interested, no matter what I
do, so I have to keep notes and then try to remember where I've kept
THOSE. Thankfully my curiosity will kick in at some point despite
the subject and SOMEthing will strike me as interesting, so at least
I remember enough of that piece to muddle my way through.

My biggest complaint is that there is not enough time to learn
everything.

Yet despite all these wonderful feelings that I experience as a
byproduct of brain growth, there are people who refuse to learn. I
never understood those people. Nor do I understand those who can't
seem to learn. Are they not interested enough? Am I really all that
smart, or am I simply highly curious? Is it my attitude? Where does
the attitude come from? Where does intelligence come from? Why do
some people find reasons to absorb knowledge while others avoid it at
any cost?

Like everything else, intellectual variety helps to keep the world
spinning, but I still can't help but wonder about these things, as I
do not yet understand them. That is curiosity.

One of my ponderings for the day.

~nv