Helen’s Comments (group member since Aug 24, 2011)

Helen’s comments from the Autodidacts group.

Hi guys, I discovered Goodreads earlier this week, and today I discovered this group.

It was interesting to read your introduction posts, you all have different paths to autodidactism, and the same goes for me.

I have never been to university, in fact, I left High School at the end of Year 10 (in Australia that is two years before graduation). I left because the schedule of classes for the remainder of my high school life was setup up in such a way that I couldn't study down the path I wanted, so I decided to leave, get a job and look after my own educational needs. That was at the tender age of 15.

The job I walked in to a month after leaving school was banking, and I stayed there for almost 10 years before getting frustrated with the sales culture. This is where my story becomes a little similar to yours, Gerald. I went in to business for myself, setting up and running two businesses over the next 12 years. The first was in learning and development, specifically adult vocational education, mostly around business administration, IT and management. The second was graphic design, which was a result of my dabbling in art since I could pick up a crayon.

Eventually I got bored with both of these and changed career once more, using my learning and development skills to start off in Human Resources, where I still work full-time today as a consultant in workforce planning and development.

Throughout this I have guided my own learning. I have formal qualifications in business, IT, design, management, HR, journalism and adult education. These are all formal, bread-winning learning achievements, but the process was no-less enjoyable.

What I value more is the other education I have guided myself through since leaving school. It has been disorganised, sporadic at times and directionless for the most part, but at its centre is the desire for knowledge. Two of my great passions are art history and the origins of the English language.

My goal is to give myself a classical education, something that was gone from the school system in Australia by the time I went through it. I'm starting from scratch and following the Trivium process of grammar, logic and rhetoric. Which means I'm starting to learn my Latin and Greek, and reading the classics of literature.

So that's me. I'm looking forward to being part of this group, small though we are at the moment, I think there are some good conversations to come.