Why Study?

This is an article that I recently wrote for my school juniors, to be published in a souvenir that my school (De Paul School, Berhampur, Odisha) is bringing out on the occasion of its Silver Jubilee. You are requested to think from the perspective of a high school student (Class 9-10) while reading this article.

I happened to come across a TEDx talk by Simon Sinek, the author best known for developing The Golden Circle and popularizing the concept of Why, that inspired me to write this article. Simon narrated this interesting story:

All of us know the Wright Brothers - the men credited with inventing and building the world's first successful airplane. But most of us do not know Samuel Pierpont Langley. In the late 19th/early 20th century, when building a powered flight was a hot topic of research and development, Samuel Pierpont Langley had everything of what we assume is the recipe for success. He had money; he was given $50000 by the War Department to design a powered airplane (that would have been more than 24 lakhs Indian Rupees today; this ofcourse was sometime around 1900). He had a seat at Harvard and the Smithsonian institution, and had access to the best infrastructure and facilities available during those times. He hired the best minds and the best talent that money could find to work for him. The New York Times used to follow him around everywhere, and everyone was looking up to him to make this 'flying machine'. Then how come we have never heard of Samuel Pierpont Langley?

A few hundred miles away were the Wright Brothers - Orville and Wilbur. They had none of what Langley had. They had no money; they paid for their dreams from the earnings from their bicycle shop. Not a single person in their team had college education, not even Orville or Wilbur. The New York Times followed them nowhere. But they were driven by a cause - a belief that if they could figure out this flying machine, it will change the course of the world. Samuel Pierpont Langley was different; he wanted to be rich, he wanted to be famous. The people in Langley's team worked for the result - the riches. Those with Wright Brothers worked for the cause - the belief. And eventually, on December 17, 1903, the Wright Brothers took flight. And for proof that Langley was motivated by the wrong things, here's the most shocking fact - the day the Wright Brothers took flight, Langley quit! He could have said, “That's an amazing discovery, guys! Now let's improve upon this technology.” But he didn't. He wasn't first, he didn't get famous, so he quit! Despite having the money, the infrastructure, the resources, Langley couldn't be successful.

This made me realize that we, as students, are often motivated by the wrong things, just like Langley. We often make the mistake of pursuing the result; we study because we want to score 100%, we want to win the first prize, we want to be the topper wherever we go. And we go mad in our pursuit of the result. We resort to rote learning. We follow the herd to attend all kinds of tuitions. We do whatever it takes to reach the top. And as a result, in this crazy world of competition, we don't find a breathing space to actually enjoy our studies.

The real fun of education lies in appreciating its significance and learning its practical uses (and by practical use, I don't mean scoring marks in exams). Every subject that we learn in the classroom has something useful to teach us, something that aids us in understanding this world and this universe better, something that makes us a more capable person. We need to realize and appreciate this "something", only then can we understand the significance of what we are learning, and only then can we love our subjects and have the right motivation to study them.

How often do we bother to figure out the importance of what we learn in classrooms? We study History - the ancient age, the medieval period, the modern world; but how many of us can answer why we study all of that? Just because it's part of the curriculum? Nah, that can't be the only reason! We study Chemistry - we balance chemical equations, we write oxidation and reduction reactions, we study properties of compounds - but why? Do we know if those things really matter in this world? We study Mathematics - we learn set theory, we solve quadratic equations, we multiply matrices - but do we really know how and where these things can be of any use in life? If not, then why are we studying them in the first place? Just because our parents send us to school and our teachers give us homework? Is that our only motivation?

The trick to enjoying our subjects lies in finding the right motivation. And nothing can be a better motivation than a reason to love our subjects. It might be a tad unfortunate that we get to choose to study the subjects of our choice only after Class 10 or beyond, which means that until Class 10, we are constrained to study the subjects and topics that are prescribed for us by someone else, whether we like them or not. But with the good belief that our curriculum has been designed by wise and experienced people to impart us all-round education, we must find the right motivation to study within these constraints. Whenever we study a topic or a chapter, we must try to figure out its practical significance, or its conceptual elegance, or any other good reason to love the subject, and that will help us in enjoying our studies - and that, my dear friends, will automatically spur us to do well.

So the next time you attend any class, make sure you know why you're studying whatever you're studying. When your teacher asks you to write an official letter in a Language class, know that the exercise is to make you improve your letter-writing skills, as you'll be required to write a lot of important letters (emails) in your professional career. When your teacher explains you the world regions in a Geography class, know that it is to make you appreciate the differences in culture, landscape, social life and other aspects that exist among the different regions, so that you can comfortably interact and collaborate with people of different nationalities later on in your professional life if and when the need arises. When your teacher explains Total Internal Reflection in a Physics class, know that the phenomenon is something that forms the backbone of optical fibers and the internet, and is something without which you couldn't have checked your emails or used Facebook or chatted online with friends. When your teacher makes you study something which you really don't know why you should be studying, dare to ask, because unless you know it, you can't love the chapter, you can't have the right motivation to study. Studying just because you need to score good marks is like pursuing the result, like Samuel Pierpont Langley did; studying for the love of the subjects is like pursuing the cause, like the Wright Brothers did - the choice is yours.

I am reminded of these lines by Robert Frost that I had learnt in the holy premises of De Paul in Class 8 (way back in 2001-02), and which, I must admit, have had an indelible impact on the way I have looked at life and work ever since.
  

But yield who will to their separation,
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For heaven and the future's sakes.

(Two Tramps in Mud Time, st. 9)