danashafik123 asks: Why do lots of people like math?
Hi danashafik123 –
You know it’s funny, since you also recently wrote me asking about how to be less sensitive. My friend Handsome is a very very sensitive guy – worries about everybody, cries at movies, all that. And that’s what he uses in his work all day. So you know what he really looks forward to every month? Balancing his checkbook!
And you know why? Because math is totally un-emotional. Math is all about logic and facts and the purity of numbers. If you work with emotions and the unclarity of human emotions all day, having an activity that results in a simple correct answer is a joy!
People who really love math, I imagine, spend their lives in that joy. They’re excited by the absolute truth of it, the simplicity within the complexity. Which makes total sense to me (a dog who can’t even understand addition!).
If you ever study music, or physics, or even a lot of art, it’s all based in math. Who knows, the day may come when we find that everything we know in the universe comes down to math. But in the meantime, I’d suggest you treat it as a set of puzzles. Little mysteries that have a correct answer, if you can be clever enough to find it. That sounds like fun, even to me.
Whereas the only puzzles like that for me are along the lines of “I can smell that some rodent has been in this yard, but I need to figure out where, and find him so I can chase him out!!!”
Thanks!
Shirelle