Yes, the title could mean a lot of things. And, truth be told, there were a lot of things that I learned in high school that I wish I didn’t and a lot of things that were not worthwhile, edifying or wholesome. But none of those are the point of this post. The point is, and as an assurance for people now homeschooling, what I learned in high school, how I learned it and what effect it had on me.

Basically, as far as education goes, any learning tools that I needed, I learned by the time I graduated high school. I did go on to college and graduate school. But those six years merely refined what knowledge and skills that I had already garnered.

In a world caught up with achievement and checking boxes, one often forgets the reason for learning. We don’t learn so that we can memorize or regurgitate a myriad of facts and random information. We learn so we know how to learn.

Uh… what? That last sentence sounds like a bit of circular reasoning. But whether educators like it or not, the real purpose for high school is to make certain that young adults have the tools to keep on learning. In order to do that, educators need to expose students to a wide variety of subjects and skills. What are some of the key things your teen should focus on?

In high school, I learned how to read analytically. My freshman English teacher explained a method where, particularly if you didn’t like what you were assigned to read, you could power through it and still have the salient points necessary to discuss and write about. In it, you read the first and last paragraph of each act or chapter. With those as the bracket, you went through the rest to mark the points that got the characters or argument from a to z. Genius. That technique allowed me to power through fiction, drama and even non-fiction.

For math, it was the after-hours tutoring that helped me understand. In those sessions, my teacher gave me alternatives. “If you can’t solve it this way, how about looking at the problem in another way.” Math, to my surprise, had options. There was more than one way to get to the right answer. To this day, when tutoring I’ll run into problems that don’t seem to respond to the ‘traditional’ method. Being able to discover an alternative approach is a game changer. Yes, I can still recite the Pythagorean theorem and the quadratic formula, but those rote tools would be useless without the ability to look at equations backwards and upside down as necessary.

Foreign languages taught me grammar. I don’t know why grammar, what little of it I remember in English classes, never took root. I honestly don’t remember any lessons beyond parts of speech. But when I learned foreign languages, many of the “silly” rules of sentence structure suddenly made sense. Why did clauses have to have equal weight when connected by a comma or conjunction? Well, all the conjugations were connected. It’s just that they weren’t as obvious in English because I never thought about it. I can teach English grammar today thanks to French, Russian, German and Spanish.

History classes taught me the art of the paper. My European History class, during my junior year, asked for an annotated bibliography. I begged my mom to accompany her to college so I could use their library and do my research in French since the topic I had been given was the events leading to the French Revolution. If I had been asked to write the paper that I annotated, it would have been longer than my 75-page senior thesis in college. In my American History class, the following year, we had to write the same paper five different times, each time using a different perspective. From that, I learned a lesson similar to my math tutoring—there’s more than one way to approach the same task.

I would suggest that you impress upon your teens that the point of high school is not necessarily what you learn, but that you learn how to learn. Life is about learning. That never goes away. There’s always something new around the bend. But if you learn how to learn, you will never be at a loss. New ideas, new technologies and new abilities will be yours for the taking.

So go out there and apply what you learned in high school!

Life is not normal yet. But then again, I’m not sure it ever has been. At least not since the Garden of Eden. In this world, we will have trials. This world is a place of calamities and wars and rumors of wars until the end of time. So, in that way, what we’re dealing with in this pandemic is normal.

The whole idea of normal reminds me of a title of a Patsy Clairmont book: Normal is Just a Setting on Your Dryer. I think I read it once upon a time. I know I’ve heard her talk on it. What we call ‘normal’ doesn’t exist in reality. So when we say we want things to go back to ‘normal’ what exactly are we asking for?

I think it’s a myriad of things that resolve into one word: comfort. When we long for normalcy, we crave a fairy tale world with peace and quiet and happily ever afters. Often, the normal we talk about and want to return to never really existed. We may have had a moment of it here or there, but the overarching “normal” life is as much a fantasy as the stories I write.

Still, the human soul longs for and depends on certainties. It’s not for nothing that God promises us sunrises and sunsets. We need routine. It’s part of the way we were created.

Last night, Gary and I were watching a message from Andy Stanley urging us to remember the lessons learned during these weeks. He broke those lessons into financial, social and personal. It was a good message and I recommend you watch it. But that’s not where I’m going with this. Rather than remember the lessons, I want us to employ choices.

This week, I have chosen. I have chosen to exercise each day. I have chosen to dress up. I have chosen to delete some apps. I have made a multitude of choices. When we choose, in light of what we have learned about life and ourselves, we state who we are.

I’ve missed dressing up. Now, I’m not talking as fancy as I did for Erik and Christina’s wedding. Much as I love the dress, I can’t imagine a situation to compel me to put it on other than another wedding or formal event. But I routinely, once or twice a week, would wear a skirt or a dress to tutor or go to church. I liked the process of getting dressed up. At first, daily sweats felt like a mini-rebellion (and I do cherish my rebellions). But after a while, the intensity of the casualness began to grate on my personality. Thus, I have chosen to indulge in a week of dresses and skirts. After I get “caught up” I may go back to once or twice a week. It will be the new normal that I choose.

Gary and I have both enjoyed working from home—at least some of the time. Will we be able to choose to continue more of that in our new normal? We’ll certainly try.

Being home more has helped me see things that I’d rather not have around. I’ve gotten rid of paper and things that I kept around because I might use them. I’ve chosen to realize that if I kept them for fifteen years, they’re probably never going to get used.

I could go on and on. But the process is just beginning. I am just starting to choose things that will be a part of what I deem ‘normal’ from here on out.

What would you look for as ‘normals’ in this post-virus or ongoing virus world? What behaviors and routines fit the way you are wired? What will you choose as essential aspects of the new normal world? Have you liked shopping less or do you want to shop more? Have you liked being home or do you want to make sure your life is surrounded by non-virtual people? The crazy thing about disasters thrown into life is they bless us by helping us focus on what has meaning. Some things are constant from person to person, like health and family. But other things, we choose.

What normals will you choose?

In this virus-threatened world, there are a lot of blessings. I get to stay home more often than not. I get to spend more time with my immediate family. Spring is blooming in all its loveliness outside my window. The daily pace seems slower, more relaxed.

It’s that last one that has got me in trouble.

There’s an old saying that if you want something done, give the task to a busy person. I’ve spent most of my life as a busy person. I’m a dedicated list maker. A day well done is where I’ve crossed out more on my list than I’ve left on it.

Ah. Therein lies the rub. Since we haven’t had to regularly go anywhere, I haven’t kept a list. Certain things, like this blog and my online tutoring, get done. Many things, like daily exercise and daily writing exercises, that I kept on my to-do list, have fallen by the wayside.

One of the things I committed to do during this stay-at-home was take two hours of training per week. I’ve only met that goal a handful of times. Fortunately, for me, last week was one of those times. Why fortunately? Because I took a class on managing stress. And a lot of its tips and tricks reminded me of things I used to do in the “normal” world to keep on schedule. One of those was doing the hard things first in the morning.

What do I find hard? Lengthy projects like my novels. Exercise. Organizing my day. Cleaning house. Thus, I have been trying the last few days to do those things first. (Well, right after my Bible study anyway.) And you know what? I finished a couple of short stories. I dusted my bedroom. (Long overdue!) I’ve made significant progress on the novel. And today I got my step count finished before noon.

While many things about staying home seem more relaxed, there’s still the stress of outside obligations and personal commitments hanging over my head. I can ignore them by playing endless videogames or reading novels, but that doesn’t make them go away. But ignoring what needs doing builds stress even if I pretend otherwise.

It never ceases to amaze me how much better I sleep if I actually get some of the hard things done during the day.

Therefore, the list is coming back. It feels weird to make a list of things to do when I don’t have to physically go anywhere, but it’s obvious that I function better with its presence. I also need the “now” principle from a favorite self-help book. Rather than curling on the couch and going to sleep when I feel overwhelmed, I can take small steps forward by doing what I see now.

What about you? What do you need to do to keep a sense of normalcy and stay productive? What hints have you learned about yourself and life during the last couple of months?

Because whatever this time has taught me, this one thing is true. We all need to learn from each other!