The moral learning curve

IT’S worthwhile for all of us to know about the learning curve. It tells us how fast or slow one is learning. And it can give us an idea of the different elements that come into play in this very dynamic process of learning.

Technically, the learning curve may be defined as a “graph that depicts rate of learning, especially a graph of progress in the mastery of a skill against the time required for such mastery.”

Other similar terms can be the experience curve or the efficiency curve. There’s now a growing science about this. The common attribute is the attempt to measure how one learns or acquires a skill. And learning and acquiring skills is a lifelong business of ours.

In learning, we have to realize that each one has his own pace. One’s learning curve reflects how he at the beginning will have to go through a slow stage until he gathers enough knowledge and experience so as to gain speed, height and breadth later.

In this learning curve, we have to give allowance to the expected little stumbles so that a big fall later on can be avoided. This is a basic law in life.

Once one’s learning curve is known, I think it’s a matter of justice and fairness that the time needed for one to learn be given to him. We should not push him too much. In fact, all facilities should be given to help him in his learning.

This learning curve also leads us to look into the factors and circumstances that influence the picture it gives. It can tell us about the innate capabilities of the person, as well as the external conditions that can affect the process. Thus, it is a very important tool.

Whatever can enhance one’s powers and make up for his weaknesses is always welcome. Whatever can reinforce the favorable conditions and compensate for the unfavorable ones would be a great help. Let’s try to be good at this task of helping.

This concern about the learning curve is most relevant these days, since we are all bombarded with new things, which can be a Pandora’s box. We have to help one another establish his learning curve in these new things, and aid each other achieve the most out of the challenge being posed to us now.

We have to learn to respect the requirements of our learning curve. We should be wary not to get lost or to allow ourselves to be blindly swallowed by the new things and developments. We have to be effective stewards, not slaves, of these new things.

In my conversations with people, I realize that the challenges of the new things are not small or insignificant. They have great potentials for good and for evil, to build people’s lives or to destroy them and their families.

Even the matter of how to handle and dominate the use of the Internet can require heroic efforts. Many people have somehow lost their “sanity” there. They develop addictive symptoms.

Then you have many other gimmicks and games, like the Sudoku, for example, that can offer means for resting, but can take a lot of time and can be disorienting if not alienating. Here the need for mastery and dominion, the skill to follow the proper priorities, are indispensable. They need to be learned.

This is not to mention other moral aberrations that need urgent and constant attention by way, for example, of anger and stress management, or any game plan to develop virtues like temperance, sobriety, chastity, prudence, Christian poverty, obedience, etc.

In these cases, the establishment of one’s learning curve of the appropriate moral virtues cannot be confined to an individual or private affair. It has to be done in consultation at least with some experts, guides or friends who can give effective help, usually the help of caution.

We have to do everything to promote the attitude of socialization, especially in this sphere of concern. We should not get stuck in the denial stage, where we may feel that we can still handle the challenges by ourselves.

We have to be open to seek as well as give help to others. I think this is the challenge we have these days. In today’s drift of things, we cannot afford to island ourselves from others. We have to form one organic whole, where one’s concerns somehow become the concern of everyone else.