It’s something that every parent worries about. We’re afraid they’re not learning enough. We’re concerned they’re falling behind. Is it the school? Is it us? Is there something wrong with them?
In the late 1880s, future general George Patton’s father got the sense that his son was having trouble learning. He not only wasn’t reading, he seemed to hate the subject and he labored over each word, mixing up letters and not understanding sentences. In those days, most fathers probably used brute force on kids who struggled…or worse, wrote them off as just not the school type.
But not Patton’s father.
He knew young George needed a different approach to learning. He needed to ‘find his classroom,’ needed a unique style of education. (By the way, these ideas are discussed in detail in my upcoming book Wisdom Takes Work, on shelves October 21 but available for preorder—with extras—here.)
As one biographer writes, “[His father] kept young George out of school, and instead launched him on a program of aural learning. Family members read to him until he was 11 years old, and he was required to memorize long passages from the classics, ancient history and romantic poetry.” In this form, he drank deeply from the great classics and the great tales of adventure. Patton knew King Arthur and Shakespeare, the Odyssey and Sherlock Holmes…and he knew them backwards and forwards.
With time and through this unusual approach, Patton did learn to read and not just learn, but learn to love reading. This was possible because his family was accommodating. They were patient. They didn’t give up on their son, nor did they make life easy for him. They just found the best way for him to learn and they built a curriculum and a practice about that. They gave him space, they gave him confidence and most of all, they gave him his own way to love something that he might have otherwise come to fear or resent.
We are all trying to ‘raise a reader,’ as we say in The Daily Dad. Some of us—some kids—will have an easier time of this than others, but it’s one of the most important and incredible things we can do for our kids…and for the future.
When we take the time to understand how our kids learn best, we give them the key that opens the door to lifelong learning—and eventually, to wisdom.
Wisdom takes work (that’s the title of the newest book, by the way, and you can order it here!). Lots of work. Lots of reading. Lots of teachers. Lots of experience. Lots of reflecting. It took lots of work in the ancient world and it takes lots of work today. But where would we be without it? Who would we be without it?
Life—and parenthood—is constantly putting us in difficult situations, asking us difficult questions, putting us in ethical dilemmas. How can we navigate this? How can we make sense of it?
Without wisdom, we cannot. We will be carried away. We will be misled. We will do the wrong thing.
Wisdom Takes Work, the fourth and final book in the Stoic Virtues Series, is about the work it takes to follow the timeless path to wisdom, walked by the greatest minds and figures of history. The book also contrasts the patient, practical wisdom of Abraham Lincoln with the impulsive immaturity of today’s so-called geniuses who, for all their brainpower, fail to understand so much.
Most of all, the book examines the work and methods you can take to acquire wisdom—which is available to anyone willing to earn it.
In modeling that thoughtful work for your kids, you’ll show them what it is to stay curious and to approach life with a love of learning.
Exclusive to Daily Dad, we have signed, numbered first-editions you can grab and also some exciting preorder bonuses (based on which package is purchased) like:
- A signed page of the original manuscript
- Invite to a LIVE Q&A with Ryan Holiday
- EARLY access to the Wisdom Takes Work introduction
- Two BONUS chapters from the book
- Dinner with Ryan at The Painted Porch in Bastrop, TX
Head to dailystoic.com/wisdom to get your copy of Wisdom Takes Work today!
