We were warned. Did we listen? Very few of us. They always tell you in life.... pay attention. Learn, because even the most tedious lessons will pay off one day. You just never know when. Who has the patience for "you never know when?" We need to learn patience first, clearly. Some of us stick out the tedium and we do discover that the long haul can be met with abundance. I'm still waiting on using Trigonometry though... that's just the devil's work.
Redditor u/sommai2555 wanted everyone to fess up so that the later generations know why it's important to play attention by asking.... What is something that you hated learning, but ultimately glad that you did?qui qui....
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French. Dikke-Dirk
Amen! Took French for 2 years in school. First year, didn't understand shit. Almost thought of dropping it. Now I'm pursuing DELF B1. blu7777777777
True Connection.
IRL social interaction. So much success in the world is tied to being able to interact well with people in the real world. robotlasagna
I wish my parents knew this. It's important to allow your child to have lots of friends and actually let them hang out with said friends outside of school and stuff. I was NEVER EVER allowed to go to friend's houses or go anywhere with friends unless they lived next to us/a few doors down and under strict time limits. None of my friends were ever allowed over. Now I'm an adult and I have very few friends and I don't even really feel close to them. Kids need to be able to practice and develop that skill. KatDanger
"Peaceful"
Stopped assuming that people's thoughts about me were at all similar to that extremely critical voice in my head. It's still somewhat of a struggle to stay positive... but, overall, being yourself and staying present when with others really reduces anxiety. "Peaceful" would be a good word to describe it. Withnswo05
I cried.
That I'm okay to be on my own. I used to really cling to my two best friends, and couldn't do anything without either of them. At 26 I went clothes shopping without them for the first time since I was 19. I cried. Then I did that a bit more. Then I went to the movies on my own. Then the cricket on my own. Then the football on my own. Then I travelled on my own. I learnt to become very comfortable in my own skin. And I am so so glad that I did. wolverine-claws
Road Warrior...
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Driving. I took about twice as many driving classes as anyone else I know. I was petrified the entire time and I kept mixing up left and right.
Ten years and several driving vacations later, I'm glad my parents cajoled and essentially bribed me into going through with it. aNulgoodlove
"It's fun to poo-poo & pee-pee in the toilet."
Potty training. hugestdildoyouveused
Ha! I still remember my mom saying, "It's fun to poo-poo & pee-pee in the toilet." I pondered this for a moment then realized how convenient it was to keep playing and just sh!t your pants wherever you were instead of stopping playtime to go find a bathroom. I shook my head wisely, "Nah-ah, it's fun to poo-poo & pee-pee in the diaper."
My toddler mind was a strange place. AutumnRain789
Speak Right.
English, I was about 8 or 9 years old when I hated English, maybe because of crap like: it is very difficult, I do not want to, it is that blah blah blah. The thing is that when my parents finally forced me to learn, I loved it, and thanks to that,
I met an English-speaking community as diverse as reddit is. just_a_spanish_dude
Keep Your Crazy....
Dealing with people's craziness I'm the workforce.
Currently dealing with being ghosted by a co-worker and have a goddamn dissertation along with screenshots about why I acted appropriately when I called her earlier to set up a time to talk about it after work in case HR decides to pay me a visit about "mysterious" allegations.
I know how quickly companies can shun you if you cannot justify your position or actions all too well. WannabeAsianNinja
The Passion.
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Piano. For 4 years I hated it with a passion. Then in 8th grade my piano teacher taught me a really fun song. I realized I didn't like slow classical music but upbeat and fast songs. I was super hooked on playing piano for the next 6 years.
Don't have easy access to a piano anymore but eventually I started just making up stuff as I went. And had memorized a handful of songs. Was my favorite way to de-stress and express/process my emotions in high school when I couldn't voice them or put words to my feelings. A_Somewhat_Geek
Let me hear you....
Public speaking. I was super shy and I wasn't willing to talk in front of a crowd larger than two. So my teacher pulled my ass into a public speaking contest. I was really nervous, hated every bit of it.
Flash forward a few years, a few poem recitals here and there, I'm a lot more comfortable in speaking in front of a crowd. Still nervous as heck but, at least I can speak my thoughts without running away like that one time during a presentation I had to do in front of my class. asteraft
Speaking in Tongues....
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Languages; at first it was very difficult to learn new language, after 3rd one it starts getting easier because all languages are connected. So now I know 5 languages and started learning my 6th. RedditArtur
subtext is life....
I hated learning about themes, and metaphors in literature when i was a kid, but now that I'm older, a part of me is delighted when I recognize the subtext of whatever Im reading. Tonaia
Same here. Reading becomes much more enjoyable when you understand the deeper meanings and concepts behind texts. zummm72
People Anxiety.
I had a fear of calling people. I always relied on e-mails and texting because calling someone just made me anxious for some reason. Eventually I as forced to pick up the phone at an internship, and I grew out of being anxious. Now I call people instead of waiting to finally get an e-mail back and it's just way more time efficient. DutchCheeseAddict
Basics.
Math. MessireSM
I'm here for math as well. I have worked for two people who don't understand when to multiply or divide for percentages, or when it add and subtract, and it was infuriating.
A great way to refresh your basic math skills is to take a deck of cards and start subtracting down from one hundred to zero. Or use as a very depressing party trick if you want to see how many grown folk have lost the ability to math. LollyGriff
Board Fail.
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I took keyboarding in high school. Absolutely hated the class, the teacher was awful. One of the most useful skills I have now, and I couldn't possibly do my job as efficiently, and make the kind of money I do without it. sommai2555
Vroom No.
Driving. I was 40 by the time I got my license and I regret all of the lost time. As nice as it was to be chauffeured around there's something to be said for the freedom of being able to hop in the car and go anywhere, any time. I love driving now. Other drivers, on the other hand, I could do without. everyting_is_taken
Scribbles.
Writing. Would constantly break down in tantrums when doing my writing homework during my first year of school, now I'm 150 pages through my first novel. oldmanhiggons
I'm an English teacher. I hated learning essays but wow do I love teaching them now–to students that hate learning essays. coffeeframes
The Worth.....
Something that someone told me once that became easier to live by over time:
In life there is always two ways you can go about any situation. You can react or you can respond.
Learning to respond instead of react takes time. But it's worth it. Hovie1
stick to the plan.....
Took my first programming class in high school, and hated it. Really didn't see the point, way too abstract, and just figured it wasn't for me so I decided to stick to my plan of pursuing a music career.
Later I discovered my untalented self didn't have what it took to be a musician, and now I'm a web developer. maleorderbride
The Stick.
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How to drive a manual/stick. I also learned to drive a tractor and some heavy machinery not long after and it's translated into being able to drive pretty much anything aside from a non synchro truck (which I understand in theory).
I'm pretty much always the sober driver so it's meant I can drive friends cars home if they've over indulged and keeps me and my mates safe.
It wasn't pretty learning to drive, but I'm very please I know how to now. maddogmilo93
Ok!
Cartoon Yes GIF by SpongeBob SquarePantsGiphy"Breastfeeding, sure no problem. Changing diapers on the table/booth/chair, no freaking way. There's a reason most bathrooms have a change table."
- LuntiX
Be Clean
"As long as you don't leave your dirty flip-flops on the table that's disgusting."
"Last week I was at a cafe terrace and I saw a woman breastfeeding her baby and afterwards changing the diaper on the table (which was a tad odd since they have a nice changing room there). After she left I noticed she left the dirty diaper on her plate, didn't even bother to close it up."
- domin8r
Silence
"A baby can't scream with a mouthful, so I'd say it's a win-win."
"My son used to do the same. The thing is his twin would get right to feeding and would stimulate the let down on his boob too, so it would be 20 seconds of screaming and 30 seconds of vague drowning noises before he clicked that food was happening."
Who Cares?
"The baby's gotta eat. Plus I don't even pay enough attention to other people to even notice or give a crap either way."
- Jikal
"I agree lol!! I've noticed moms breastfeeding their babies at a restaurant maybe a grand total of TWO times in my whole life, and I go out to eat all the time. However, I ALWAYS notice when a baby is screeching so loud nobody can enjoy their meal."
"I don't even mean just crying, I mean that SCREECH they do sometimes where if you're anywhere close to them you can't even continue talking, you just have to stop and WAIT for the kid to finish. (I promise I don't hate kids LOL this is just my opinion)."
No Adults
Oh No You Didnt GIF by happydogGiphy"Acceptable if she's breastfeeding her baby, weird if she's doing so with her husband."
- maajyc
So far, so normal. Stay in your own conversation. If you're that interested about another person, you're sounding like a stalker.
Whateves
Let It Go Whatever GIF by Hannah Bronfman Giphy"The more it happens the less people will care."
Couple Issues
"I was once breastfeeding my daughter on the beach, aside from my boob being *kind of* out (mostly blocked by the baby) I was wearing shorts and a shirt, more covered than most of the people on the beach. Apparently a dude started watching me that I didn't notice and his girlfriend took offense to it."
"She started to approach me, but my mom was with us and gave her the stink eye to end all stink eyes. I have to think if they had been just a little more exposed to breast feeding this wouldn't have been anything. I'm also 99% sure that incident resulted in the couple fighting."
When in Public
"I walked with my head down the majority of my life because I felt like everyone was staring at me as I'm a very tall female. Started looking up a few years ago and realized how very wrong I was. I cared WAY more about this made up scenario in my head while assuming the worst and causing MYSELF to feel shame over it- than anyone else ever cared about my height. We're all busy doing our own thing and I don't think MOST people care about women breastfeeding in public as people think they do."
In the UK...
"I went to a mall in London, England once with a room dedicated for baby care. There were comfortable chairs and a microwave and sink. There were also little rooms with rocking chairs and low light floor lamps. Now, I would feed my baby wherever the hell I needed to, but this was luxury."
Free!
Mothers Day Mama GIF by reactionseditorGiphy"I'd rather a happy baby having a meal than a hungry miserable baby screaming and crying for nourishment. I am however against the restaurant charging an opening fee."
It is what it is. Be free ladies. Whatever keeps the kid quiet, works for most of us. Do as you need.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Reddit user QadeerRay asked:
What is an item you think should be free?
The responses were honestly a lot more varied than I expected. I was positive I'd see someone mention the places that charge you for using rain water - the literal water that falls freely from the sky - but there's a lot here that I hadn't even thought about and honestly, I'm kind of salty now.
Come, be salty with me.
Notifying People Is Expensive
creepy grim reaper GIFGiphy"Death certificates." - redrivverrunning
"For me they were $16 each - and every single company that the deceased has an account for needs a copy."
"I learned to go in person to places like banks as much as I possibly can. They make a copy and give it back to me, that way I can avoid mailing it for them to keep forever so I have to buy even more official copies." - classic_elle
"In the state where I live, they charge you $20 for the first certificate and $3 for each additional one so the funeral homes generally suggest you go ahead and order 5-6 more than you think you'll need after figuring out their accounts and stuff because it's still cheaper than getting a single extra at a later time." - SilverDarner
"The UK government does have a service where you inform them of a death, provide them with the certificate, and they'll make a best effort to inform all of the person's banks and pension providers. It doesn't have nearly the number of companies being informed that I would've liked, but it's a good start."
"What confuses me is that other companies aren't jumping at the chance to be on the notification list... you'd think it would be in their best interest to be notified if one of their customers died so they can clean stuff up on their end. But oh well." - SweatyOctopussy
"Not really, (at least in the US) they would really only need to stop billing/autopay once they are informed of the death and it is confirmed. The longer they can go without that confirmation, the better it is for their bottom line."
"Source: Work in corporate America" - TheLastFartan
Looking At You, Nestle
3D Loop GIF by Pi-SlicesGiphy"Drinkable water. Looking at you, Nestle. The company has a history of taking over water sources and that whole formula thing was gross." - Whit-Batmobil
"Nestle financially pushed for hospitals in 3rd world countries to start new born babies on 'free trials' of formula feeds so the mother's weren't feeding & their milk would dry up. Essentially forcing them to buy & continue using the formula forever."
"To make matters worse, this was done in areas with no safe drinking water so babies that were only a few days old were giving formula mixed with unsafe water & many got sick/died as a direct result when their mothers could have just breastfed them safely and for free."
"Even when Nestle was alerted to this (as if they didn't already know) they refused to change their tactics. The company is scum." - now_you_see
In Public
bathroom GIFGiphy"Using public toilets in Europe." - pretty_pumpkin
"Personally, here in Germany I find it is counter-intuitive. I think people resent having to pay for a toilet, and treat it like 'Alright, you're going to charge me €.50 for a pee, I'm going to get my money's worth then and just piss everywhere, because f--- you for making me pay to pee.' "
"This I find is especially true with toilets where the cleaning is 'automated.' On the other hand, you go into a lot of department stores, or a mall, etc, the toilets are often attended to by a person sitting just outside the entrance. Payment is usually optional (i.e. there is no turnstyle you have to unlock by putting money in), but it is typical to put €.50 or so in the dish on your way out... and in those cases I find the bathrooms very clean."
"Other bathrooms, particularly those along the autobahn, are actively serviced, but have a payment turnstile thing you have to go through. You can then use the receipt from the turnstile at the fast food and snack shops which are a part of the building, and you'll get the amount you paid at the bathroom deducted from your purchase."
"But overall public bathrooms are just terribly hard to find (paid or otherwise). Public pissing is common and basically unavoidable. You see it and smell it regularly." - Mozambique-Ready
Insulin
michael douglas greed GIF by 20th Century Fox Home EntertainmentGiphy"Insulin industry is actually hijacked by three companies and they're doing all they can to keep it's price high."
"It's not a luxury. It keeps people alive! Show some humanity."
"• Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk and Sanofi are the three companies that dominate more than 90% of the world insulin market by value. This means that they can set prices as they wish."
"• Production cost of insulin is about 2% of it's market price."
"• Unlike any other medicine, there is no generic insulin. Insulin is still under patent after 37 years. 'Big three' producers are abusing legal loophole for over 4 decades. (Known as Patent evergreening)."
"• These companies make profit of worth billions. Not to mention they're spending millions on lobbying politicians and donating to other decision makers to keep quiet."
"• They pay another companies not to enter the market. Or they sue them. That's what happened to company called Merck. Sanofi sued them." - DogDisguisedAsHooman
Standard Bathroom Care
tampons ugh men GIF by DiggGiphy"Uhm tampons and pads in public restrooms, schools, etc. Freak I'm a penis carrier and even I think that sh*t should be free."
"You would be mad if you went in to a public restroom and there was a coin slot for the f*cking toilet paper."
"I don't think they should be free off the shelf. Everything requires money to make so in reality nothing is free, but this should be standard care in every bathroom just in case." - TripleThickBacon
We're Not Here For Fun
season 8 episode 23 GIFGiphy"Hospital parking. Oh, dad's dying? Doesn't matter. 5 bucks." - bdd4
"Where I live you go in for free, but they do charge to leave. If you get your parking validated, (pretty much just saying you had a reason to be there as a patient or visitor) you get to leave for free."
"They had a huge issue with people parking there for free, but not even being there for the hospital. Just a place to park as they did business or shopping downtown where the hospital is located." - Howling_Fang
"You're gonna love this. We as hospital staff have to pay to park the hospital as well!"
"I am close to graduating from a medical program and some area hospitals hire from graduates of our school's program over other applicants so they have meetings at our campus about working there and benefits, etc"
"the cheapest parking package they offered, which is still a MASSIVE hike to the door is $50 a week, the most expensive being $100 a week."
"They made it a point to highlight that their staff ride all the city buses for free with our ID cards and they bring you to the front door, so that's something at least." - xBlackx_xDahliax
The Dreaded Paywall
Pay Me Kim Kardashian GIF by GQGiphy"Scientific articles. They're mostly behind a paywall."
"You can either subscribe to certain journals so that you have access year-round ($ depends on the specific journal), or you can pay for access to one article at a time. The latter is usually about $30-$50."
"As a scientist, this has always irritated me. People on social media everywhere reference blogs and other non-scientific articles, which are, of course, ill-informed and non-scientific."
"We should be linked to science journals when we Google - but then every time we're interested in some topic, pay $50 to read about it?? That's ridiculous."
"Even news media reporting on interesting results from science pubs get the results mucked up. You really can't trust anything but the peer-reviewed paper itself." - BrahmTheImpaler
"I firmly believe this is one (of many!) reasons why the US is full of anti-science/anti-intellectualism rhetoric."
"We keep information locked behind paywalls, creating yet another socioeconomic barrier for attaining knowledge. Even if the desire to learn is there, it means incredibly little without the ability to access the information." - sayhellotojenn
Buying My Info Back
Confused Always Sunny GIF by It's Always Sunny in PhiladelphiaGiphy"Schufa Auskunft."
"This private company in Germany just collects all your information (like a credit score) without your consent and the you have to buy all that info back from them because otherwise no landlord will ever accept you."
"There is a free Schufa you can request that once a year (so bad luck if your search for a home takes over a month) and it's also not the full one. Some landlords still demand the full one." - GreenKangaroo3
Seeing Is A Luxury?
Glasses Seinfeld GIFGiphy"I have insurance and I still have to pay (in my opinion) too much to just be able to see."
"It's not a luxury, it's a basic need. Also, my sight changes all the time so I can't even get a nice pair and be set for the next few years. If I'm lucky I'll get to keep a pair for 1,5 to 2 years before I absolutely need new glasses." - Proper-Literature173
"I think it's weird that vision and dental are separate from health insurance. Like seeing and chewing are just vanity." - FistedTate
"I can't believe how far I had to scroll to find this, I passed 3 waters and chicken nuggets. Why does it cost money to see? And I have 20/20 vision so this doesn't affect me." - Tian_Lord23
So tell us, what you YOU make free for everyone if you could?