Learning to Work

For some reason, I've been thinking lately about the process of learning a skill.  Here are a few random quotes that I think are especially relevant to the work of small-scale farming and ranching:

"To be successful with sheep, even when you're not thinking about them, you'd better be thinking about them a little." - Ivan Doig

"It's not a thing you can learn inside a day." - Dougie McLean

"The difference between a journeyman mechanic and an apprentice is knowing how hard you can hit something without breaking it." Russ Melendez (our mechanic)

"There are so many ways for a man to be a fool, he can't possibly avoid them all." - Ivan Doig

"Wake up in the morning and plow to the end of the row." - Adrienne Young

"10,000 hours is the magic number of greatness." - Malcom Gladwell

"'You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers.  You will have to live them out - perhaps a little at a time.'  'And how long will that take?'  'I don't know.  As long as you live perhaps.'  'That could be a long time.'  'I'll tell you a further mystery,' he said. 'It may take longer.' - Wendell Berry

I hope you'll post your own thoughts about learning to work - learning to live, really!