This past weekend I was visiting my daughter in Vancouver B.C. and spent an afternoon wandering around the campus at UBC.

One of the first beautiful spring days and being exam week students were sprawled on the grass or at benches outside the library with books, lunches and laptops.

The library was titled the Irving K. Barber Learning Center, housed in a much older stone building,

dated 1925 from the inscription on the top tower.

The newer library is shaped like an upside down book.

This got me pondering how we value learning, whether academic, experiential, or life long. If you are like me you have had to face exams at some point either in high school, university or in some professional and/or personal course. Some times we move with ease at our knowledge base and other times stress and anxiety may overwhelm I have these often recurring dreams that on the way to the exam room I lose my way, thus miss the final exam & lose my credits for the course, often true in subjects like economics and chemistry!

At this stage in life I have come to value learning as the journey or life long process & not necessarily the achievement or end result ( although computer exams such as electronic medical record training still somewhat freak me out! )

Erik Erikson talks about different life stages, and the value of mentoring as we grow older....the sharing of our own life experiences to assist others in the same field. Coaching is a similar sharing process but the encouragement by the coach for the learner to develop and master their own often new skill sets.

We often in the western world forget the privilege we have to have to have access to schools, when we hear of such stories as Malala who almost died in her fight for the right to educate girls in her country.

Share some of your own thoughts and/or journey on learning, joys and difficulties!