I was thinking about that when I was dropping my 6 year old off at some hobbies earlier - it’s pretty much expected to have learned how to ride a bicycle before starting school, and it massively expands the area you can go to by yourself. When she went to school by bicycle she can easily make a detour via a shop to spend some pocket money before coming home, while by foot that’d be rather time consuming.
Quite a lot of friends from outside of Europe either can’t ride a bicycle, or were learning it as adult after moving here, though.
edit: the high number of replies mentioning “swimming” made me realize that I had that filed as a basic skill pretty much everybody has - probably due to swimming lessons being a mandatory part of school education here.
The swimming lesson thing was interesting. I also assumed everyone learned how to swim in school.
I took swimming classes at my local YMCA after I was able to afford a membership as a young working adult. I was 25 at the time and in my swimming class, I was taught by someone that was much younger than I was and received very odd looks from either the young kids or the elderly folks at the swimming pool learning how to swim.
Despite the odd looks, I kept at it and finally learned how to swim!! I used to be deathly afraid of the water and never went in the deep end as I never knew how to stay afloat.
One thing that was the most difficult to unlearn as an adult was keeping myself perpendicular to the pool as I always relied on being able to stand on the floor pool to keep myself from sinking.
I also realized that chlorine destroys your ability to see the next day after being in the pool. My vision stayed blurry for days and not even my glasses were able to fix it. So if anyone reading wants to learn how to swim at a later age, definitely invest in swimming goggles.
Very good. People give odd looks about anything that doesn’t fit their little bubble world, so just ignore them. :)
If that was easy, I’d probably know how. Maybe I don’t know how because I’m not 25 yet lol
Yeah absolutely. I learned at 35. Maybe you learn faster than me. :)
What sparked the change?
Honestly I was just so concerned all the time about what others were thinking, to the degree that i got scared of doing anything even remotely outside the box.
It changed when I got tired of feeling that way every single day. I just had enough of that feeling you know? It’s a bit like just getting sick of your own emotions and you just feel this need to escape that emotion.
I think some people drink to kill that feeling. But I’m not a big drinker. Mother was alcoholic and it wrecked everything completely. I knew there must be a better way.
I think it starts with realizing that other people are not better then you. You need to stop apologizing for who you are and just realize that you are fine. And also to like yourself for something. Maybe you are just kinder then others. Whatever it is, start focusing on that and realize you are good enough and you don’t have to apologize for existing in this world.
I mean, that is perhaps a part of my situation. It’s something that fluctuates as to whether it’s on anyone’s mind or not. I wish it was a factor nobody had to partake in. It’s painfully pervasive though.
As a small child in Oregon, US, there was no swimming program at my (private) school, but my parents made sure that I learned to swim in the municipal pool. I remember the scorecard for early lessons — paddling was much easier than some of the other required skills, like “opening your eyes underwater”, ouch!
I didn’t have swimming lessons in school until I was 15 or so, but then everyone except one of my classmates already could swim.
And I was seriously confused because not knowing how to swim was on the same level as not knowing how to ride a bike or use a fork.