This post was inspired by a conversation I had last night about finding the things that we need to do in life, how education often confuses this process, and the inherent ability of people to learn. I was speaking with someone in the video game industry who will be coming to do a workshop with my youth program and we were talking about how he got into the field. He said that video games were one of those things that consumed him - that he wanted to know more about, wanted to know how they worked and why. I liked how he put this. That finding our paths is about finding those things that are so interesting we want to experience more, know all about, and then build from and create our own. When allowed to pursue those interests, people tap into their creative potential, are self-actualized, fulfilled, and with guidance learn to think critically about what they are doing. In my view this is the opposite experience to schooling where young people are forced to experience everything. This process of spreading oneself thin across so many subject areas leads to a life of constant motion, of searching, but of never really delving deeply into anything. I feel it in my own life. It has taken a long time to break the habits of school, to focus, and commit to work that I find fulfilling and meaningful. For a long time I always felt like I should be doing something else...

How then do we solve this problem of education? How do we set up schools so that young people will have choices and can follow what they know, can be consumed by the things they are interested in, but can also receive the guidance necessary so that they think about why they do things and the effects those actions have on the world. There are some universities doing work like this, with individualized majors, etc., but how can this be expanded? I started a school with friends of mine in New York, the Nomadic Center for Institutionless Learning, we set up a series of workshops where all the students were teachers and teachers students. I have a vision that someday we can use this model to set up a Center for Institutionless Learning that will have a location, will have programs for youth and adults and will be focused on individualized learning where all students can follow their own paths, share the things they learn as they are consumed by them, and where we could create an environment of support, critical thinking, and love. Learning is about finding the things that we love. Maybe it is in the institutions where education becomes about something different, about separating what one knows and what one needs to know.