Having skills is really pertinent in the world we I live in. You could see a person do so many things at the same time and the fun fact is that they do these things with so much confidence; making it hard for people not to believe that they're perfect at it.
Sometimes I wonder, why not be a Jack of all trades and a master of all?. From my perspective, this isn't totally impossible as the human brain is capable of taking in so much information but then, why haven't I reached this phase yet?
My simple truth is, as humans we cannot thrive with just one A+ skill. If a person decides to be very good at one thing, that's great but what about the rest of the things. I am one very independent person and this has helped me with my minimalist lifestyle. As a minimalist, the goal is to declutter as much as possible and also live a very simple life. Well, this can't happen when you're always having a lot of people around you in a bid to help you out with certain things.
You want to fix a bulb, you call someone, you want to paint your regular nails, you call someone, you want to stitch a tear on your dress, you call someone. This way, you're taking away the "minimal" from minimalist. These simple skills could help a great deal. I wouldn't want to be the greatest electrician or the world's best nail technician but I'd most definitely want to have the basic idea about the skills.
To answer the question, I'd love to have a 'C' in various skills rather than an 'A' in just one skill. Why? Because I have tested both and the "jack's of all trades" always have the upper hand.
To reiterate, I started the first paragraph with the line "the world we I live in". Being a master of one particular skill was a very big thing in the past. Literally everyone would depend on that master and when the master wasn't in the mood to do a job, it was their loss and not his. Life must have been very easy for the master and not for the rest of the people of course. But then things changed. There was a need and so the 'Jacks' were birthed.
There was a time when I was very reluctant to learn any type of skill and on top of the "don't learn skills" was how to use a personal computer. To show you how serious I was, I dropped the subject computer at a heartbeat when I was given the opportunity in highschool. Funny fact, my house is filled with computer guru's and here I was. I didn't even know how to copy and paste. Terrible.
Moving on, I eventually came across the blockchain after so much hesitation and that was when I realised that there was no running
anymore. I had one skill–writing– but that wasn't enough. In the beginning, I wasn't just learning one skill, it was an array of skills from using the computer, to writing error-free, to photography, to graphic design. One wouldn't believe that I learnt graphic design because of Hive but yes, I did. I'm still far from perfection but I could always get by.
In comparison to when I began and was always dependent on literally everyone around me, it feels better now to be able to do your thing to a degree of perfection.Till date, I have no regrets about learning so many skills but I'm certain that I would have been troubled If I didn't learn those skills when I did.
I'd love to end with one of my favourite quotes from Alvin Toffler. It says "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."
This is my article in response to the #kiss blogging idea. You could check here for more information
All images used belong to me and were taken with my mobile device
With love, wongi ✨