Mental Exertion

MENTAL EXERTION
When I told a friend I pulled through school by means of sheer intelligence and not much of brilliance she couldn’t keep the laughter down. Those days, if you were bad in mathematics, you were absolutely condemned and branded dull. The smarter kids were considered to be great with calculation. And yes, I was bad in calculation but I managed to have a pass in it before going off to college.
This is why the friend was surprised when I answered almost every question involving calculation he asked. The only reason I was able to answer some of those question he asked was probably because learning mathematics was a traumatic experience. Kids don’t get to forget anything traumatic.
I absolutely have no use for almost all I learnt in calculations today; the geometry, equations and things I don’t have a name to call. If I could see into the future then to know what I would become and had a will power strong enough to resist much spanking, I could have chosen what to learn in the horrific subject called Math’s by those who are fond of it. Learning numbers, additions and multiplication would have just been alright for me.
Every maths experience left me with a headache. This is no exaggeration. The headache ranged from very mild to absolutely nagging, depending on how long the teacher stayed in class. And two periods that lasted for two hours were dedicated to this subject.
To many folks in high school (since it was a science school) Math’s was like an easy code. They said its as simple as A.B.C  and that was the problem. A.B.C wasn’t quite simple for me growing up. I had to cram it all too
Whenever I heard the statement “Its as simple as A.B.C”  I always marveled. Perhaps to many, the alphabet is quite easy and doesn’t require much mental exercise to decipher, recite and arrange. No, it doesn’t, really; I could recite from A-Z. I could identify them all.  It was putting them in order that baffled me and I battled with. Putting Alphabets in order was a task. And really till date, it’s a mental exercise I find no pleasure in engaging in. An exertion of the brain, perhaps necessary, but I will rather indulge in wholesome intellectual exercise often stimulated by reading a good book. That way, you glean wisdom from others. To start to locate where letter J, F, or K are in alphabetical order still requires me to start reciting all from the beginning, A to know which letter is before and behind which.
Somehow, as a child, I had always suspected verbal reasoning was a sneaky sinister way by lovers of math’s to find a way to introduce calculation into English as a subject, after all, I was doing better in English. And that was the most important subject to pass to get to college, not even mathematics.
I’ve discovered I have better verbal skills than numerical skills. This could be the case for some humans. It doesn’t make us less smart. We don’t have to all be an Einstein. Shakespeare too was a genius. At least, I think so.
The fact that different segments of the brain process the verbal and numerical aspect of life is enough evidence that one can be good in an area, have better skills than the other. Scientist at Stanford University School of Medicine discovered years ago an increase in activities of about one- two million nerve cells in an area of the brain when the eyes see the number 4 as opposed to four, written in words. Activities in this area naturally subside when the letter is in word form. The fact is that, a part of our brain helps process numbers, another, alphabets. Each part can be developed base on what we expose it to. Our natural inclinations towards learning either verbal or numerical skills determine what we develop over time. And like Sherlock Holmes who first learnt from Dr Watson that the Earth indeed revolves round the sun, its not absolutely bad to focus on our strength and know so well matters relating to our field and relevant to our lives. And now that I have learnt simultaneous equation, I shall do my best to forget it.

Teju Duru is a freelance journalist. She devoted her heart to Jesus sometimes ago.