Selfish, but Smart

Today, I was sitting in class thinking about how much I hate work. I worried that I was a lazy person and that I had a poor sense of responsibility. I don't want to work now. I don't want to work when I'm in college. Even when I've graduated everything that I can imagine myself doing, isn't really working.

To my relief, I realized that my problem was not laziness or responsibility. My problem is that there is so much for me to explore and learn and working takes away so much of the precious time that I could be discovering new things. It makes plenty of sense and it's a great reason not to work. I'm young and I should be learning everything I can about the world. Of course, saying that I don't want to work because I want more time to read and explore and try new things, might sound a little selfish to some.

In a way it is. After all, I'm asking for some one else to support my education and hobbies and interests while I enjoy them and don't even have a job. It sounds ridiculous to me! I can't even imagine how the person having to pay for it would feel.

Think, though, about how important learning is. I need the chance to try and make movies with my friends. I need days where I take off on a road trip to explore the city. I need time to read about things in far off places. I need to learn! I love to learn! Learning and trying and discovering all these great, interesting things is the only thing that I know that I love to do.

Having a job holds me back. I understand that there is much to learn from having a job though. I can't really say that I've learned any great new skills or corrected old bad habits because of having a job. I've always been the type of person who's on time, I've always been good with customers and following directions. In fact, I think the only benefit I've had from having a job is learning to balance my time more. Well, I guess the money is a benefit too, but barely. I think I made more when I was a babysitter.

Anyways, I think every teenager should have the experience of having a job, but maybe they should just have a summer job or two. Anything else just keeps them from learning. To be honest I'm not working that much lately. The awesome part about having a part time job is that sometimes they only schedule you for three hours some weeks. Can you detect my sarcasm? I need the money, but I don't need the job. Well, this week I'm actually taking time to do other things. Unfortunately it's midterm week and I started the week off with the flu, so I haven't really done anything all that fun.

Education is important though and everyone knows that, so why are people who want to concentrate on learning instead of working viewed as selfish and irresponsible? I just want to learn. Right now, that is my responsibility, not work.