As much as I love learning, I’ve had to accept that the vast majority of books have very little to offer, and this often won’t be clear until you’ve actually read some of them. Obviously, this is where libraries can save you a lot of money, but libraries increasingly focus on fiction books and very rarely have the kinds of more academic books that appeal to me, so I keep spending away.
However, as my big move out of Colorado slowly approaches, I can’t help but look at all the books I’ve built up over the past 4 years and think, “Damn, I kind of hate having all of these books”. It’s time to initiate the purge!
On a very personal note, I think I’m finally ready to give up my scholarly ambitions. I seem to jump from one subject to the next with delusions of grandeur, wondering if maybe this will be the subject that gets attached to my name. I know some really smart people who have actually been called to academia, but I accept that at this point in my life, I haven’t been. God’s always been shifting my priorities back toward software and computers and, quite frankly, money. I don’t think there’s anything particularly wrong with having your name attached to a subject, even if you just earn a master’s degree in it, but I think for me this has always been a substitution for a having a firmer identity, one in Christ (as cliche as that sounds), rather than something that has, undoubtedly, almost always been for my own glory. The other hard truth is that I’m simply not that smart. I bought a book on Cultural Ecology that I read in two or three weeks because it was so fascinating, but 6+ months later, I really have no memory of what precisely I learned. Now, that doesn’t mean I didn’t learn anything – I may just not be aware that I specifically picked it up from that book – but the extra effort it takes for me to really synthesize information doesn’t exactly have “career academic” written all over it, more like “perpetually curious self-learner who reaches a point of satisfaction and moves on”.
I was praying about this the other day, and it jumped out to me that I’ve been focusing on knowledge rather than understanding. I feel like knowledge can sometimes be very selfish, especially if you just want a lot of it so you can feel smart about yourself, whereas understanding is more nuanced and practical. I also think that some of my desire to have a lot of knowledge has stemmed from this feeling that I’m not worthy unless I’m really good at something.
I recently had this dream about playing Fortnite, an online battle royale game where only one person remains (think Hunger Games). There were two of us at the very end, and I jumped up into this area to take on the other person, but before I even had a chance to start shooting, the end-of-game sound played and the action stopped. I had “won”, but in second place. It was like God saying, “When you play my game, you don’t have to be the best at anything. And I show you when you’ve reached the right place”.
As I started going through more books last night, I did something I’ve never really done before and prayed about which books were worth keeping, to some rather fascinating results. I was so proud of my Buddhist text, A Summary of the Great Vehicle, but it was a terrible book to start with because it was so philosophical and metaphysical, and really did absolutely nothing to help me understand Buddhism. “You won’t be needing that”. If I still want to learn more about Buddhism, and I do, there are way better primary source texts to read, but they are not a priority right now. Moreover, since I plan to shift away from software development soon, I felt at peace ditching my T-SQL book. I don’t hate databases, or SQL, but writing database scripts was one of the things about my past jobs that bored me out of my mind, at least if I had to do it very often. I have no desire to learn T-SQL in greater depth, so off it goes.
There was a time I wanted to go nuts on history, but ever since discovering that the Bureau of Land Management has actually uploaded survey and plat documents from the 1800s on their website, I’ve learned enough about my favorite valley to kind of call it quits, aside from actually exploring the place on foot. Some of the history books I’ve acquired have been a little too in-depth for me to really care, so they are slated for donation as well.
I bought these two books on Algebra to beef up my math skills, but I realized they aren’t super useful for low-level programming, the only real reason I would learn more math. I just read some C code the other day that does bitwise operations on hex values (fuck me…), but those Algebra books aren’t actually going to help me learn about those things, I just have to sit down and knuckle through the hard learning it takes to fully understand them.
Besides, more than quantity of books, I’ve always craved quality. I love finding those books where the whole thing just feels immensely accessible and valuable. They are rare, and you naturally have to spend some time reading stinkers before you find the gems, but that’s what doing a book purge is about – accepting that some books are not as valuable as you thought they were, and moving on.
One more thing, too. In my second post In Defense of Evolution, I mentioned how I wish more people in the church knew about archaeology and the Bible without simply quoting other Christians in ignorance. And a little thought popped into my mind, “Why not be that person yourself?” I think I picked on pastors a bit, but there’s no reason a capable layperson couldn’t fill the same role. And you know, my study of the ancient world, back when I was in college, was hampered by a lack of wisdom. I had all of these books on the subject, but many of them were far too niche in their material, and some made extensive reference to languages I never really learned. In retrospect, a lot of that “study” time was wasted because I didn’t know how better to study. But I do now. And the thought occurred to me, “You know, you don’t have to dedicate your whole life to the study of things like that in order to point people in the right direction. If you picked it back up, with clear and realistic goals and expectations, you really could be a go-to person on the subject, and rather than just having ‘knowledge’ to dump on others, you could actually help people discover the resources they need for better understanding things”. And wow…I really like that idea.
Another argument against trying to be more of an academic is that I hate owning too many things. Just give me two book cases of top quality books and I’ll probably be happy. I don’t want anything to do with basements or boxes or attics full of books. No dusty tomes and colleagues’ manuscripts or any nonsense like that. Just a bright, happy living space, maybe a few cats, good information, and time, lots of time, for better things.
Also…I hate moving. And the fewer things I have to deal with when moving, the better. Talking real motivations, here….