The Love of Learning …. Be a Philomath.

Can a man be a master of many subjects? You've probably heard the saying "Jack of all trades, master of none." Which implies that when you learn many things, you lose the ability to become master of any of them. Also if you have heard the noble handbook for a moral lifestyle, "Subhashithaya"; written by Alagiyawanna Mukaweti, which is an unique book of advisory poems, there is also one poem dedicated to show impossibility of mastering many fields.

If above poem is loosely translated to English what it says is that a man in this world will be clever for one work and another person will clever for another work. This will not change. Similar to the fact that no matter whether it is a rainy or sunny neither a ship will go in the road nor the cart will go on the water. However mastery of multiple disciplines is not a novel concept. From the time immemorial various men and women walked on this Earth who have mastered in various fields simultaneously. They who decided to learn many subjects as and when possible contributed immensely for the innovation and the novelty of this world. One of the unique person who have cultivated the love of lifelong learning in many subjects and mastered in them all is none other than Leonardo da Vinci who’s working involved invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, writing, history, and cartography. Thomas Hobbes (whose fields were political philosophy, history, jurisprudence, geometry, the physics of gases, theology, ethics, and general philosophy) and Benjamin Franklin (a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, freemason, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat) are both renowned polymaths. They are just three of the famous personalities out of vast number of individuals who are lifelong learners. We all are born with free will. Everyone when they were children knew what they want, how they want something to be and more importantly how to spend the time in satisfaction. Without jealousy, greediness and the social pressure this was easy. But when they grow older these elements start to play a major role in decision making. Today's world encourages speciality. The norm or the concept that a person nurtured to complete a specific set of tasks was further popularized by the Henry Ford, Ray Kroc and many others in their successful businesses. They made great fortunes creating systems that could be run by people specialized to do one part of the task. This is an excellent concept to get an accurate and a quick result by working as a team. Teamwork is good thing but do you like to be a cog? For an example if you are good at cutting fabric for clothing do you want to spend your entire life to improve the cutting techniques? Or do you want to learn how to sew a garment and complete the product. May be you also like to study about fabric and pattern making. Imaging you as the world’s top fabric cutter for clothing. Still are you loosing anything by studying other areas? The answer is obvious. There is nothing to loose instead you’ll be able to streamline the total production and who knows you’ll be able to invent new concepts or you’ll become a famous personality of the world. Innovations and enhancements are limitless, all this because you decided to learn more without locking your brain to engage only on the cutting fabric for clothing. On the other hand why do you want to be the best in a single field when you can become better in several fields? It is obvious a man can’t be the best or learn all the treads in the world. But I don’t see the importance of restricting to a single field. If you want to specialize in one field, go for it nobody is stopping you. But don’t stop there. Learning is a lifetime journey and the human brain is capable for it. Try your level best to learn and apply the very speed you did when you were a kid. What you can learn, explore and produce are limitless and only you should be the decider of your limits.