Cultivating the Discipline of Study

Our world is restless, this much is clear. As I have observed in previous blogs, the speed of the modern world is only accelerating as new technologies allow people to access whatever they seek at unprecedented rates. Surfing the web, in particular, has never been easier, and with it, the vulnerability to succumb to the siren’s song of amusement.

Amusement is a passive state of entertainment. At its core, it is a form of distraction. People seek amusement when they are bored, when they seek to delay or avoid more difficult tasks, or when they have simply grown habituated to use their time unproductively. At times, amusement can serve as a form of escapism. When the pressure-points of life become exceedingly great, people seek to distract themselves temporarily from the present. Finally, and oddly enough, amusement can serve as a classroom management tool. Teachers implement techniques of amusement when they feel the attention of their students slipping and need to maintain control until the bell rings.

In this blog, I want to put forward an alternative to amusement: the discipline of study. Study is the act of intellectual reflection on something of substance–a person, an event, an idea, a book, and so forth. It entails getting to the real nature of something through sustained contemplation. Study takes work–deep work–as habits of attention and careful thinking are cultivated over the long-term. Educators, whether at school or at home, would do well to pursue the discipline of study in both their personal lives and in their instruction.

What is Study?

Unfortunately, we tend to think of study in modernistic terms as merely a form of academic production. For example, we instruct students to study the previous chapter for an upcoming test. Why? So they will be prepared to perform well on the evaluation, to produce high-quality results. Study in this context is less concerned with cultivating an integrated inner life as it with maximizing academic output.

In Leisure: The Basis of Culture (Ignatius Press, 1952), Josef Pieper puts words to the feeling of uneasiness we experience about this view of study. Following thinkers in the Middle Ages, Pieper differentiates between ratio and intellectus as definitions of understanding. 

Ratio is the active process of the mind to actively and discursively pursue understanding. It entails logical thinking and argumentation in order to reach some final conclusion. Ratio has very much consumed the modern way we think of study in which the mind is bent on some final result. Intellectus, on the other hand, is the receptive state of the mind to contemplate, similarly to the way the human eye beholds a landscape (28). It is not active, but passive, insofar as it awaits with anticipation to be moved by Truth.

The discipline of study, as I am thinking of it here, should be understood as a way of cultivating intellectus. It is the sustained act of contemplation, but in a restful and expectant sort of way. It is not weighed down by a future evaluation or the burden of production. Rather, when one engages in study, she peacefully wades into the intellectual deep, allowing her mind to contemplate what is true, good, and beautiful.

This act of reception, paradoxically, is easier said than done. Study, as Richard Foster observes in Celebration of Discipline (Harper and Row, 1978), can be difficult. It is is a skill developed through sustained effort until it becomes habit. But both the content of what we study and the very act of studying have the potential to form us. Foster writes, “What we study determines what kinds of habits are to be formed. That is why Paul urged us to center on things that are true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, and gracious” (55).

The Conditions for Study

Study is a discipline of the inner life. It allows us to get closer to knowledge of reality itself: more intimate understanding of ideas, events, relationships, ourselves, and most importantly, God. But there are a couple conditions for study. A slower pace is one of them. Time for quietness and stillness is another. These conditions are not common in the modern world, especially in modern schools.

Educators today try to cram as much as they can in a given day. Whether the pressure comes from administration, state objectives, accreditation standards, or from within, educators have become masters of efficiency. They map out the schedule with the detail of an engineer, ensuring that no minute be wasted or block be deemed futile.

Unfortunately, this approach to scheduling leaves little room to cultivate the discipline of study. Study requires quiet time for reflection. It calls for silence, simplicity, and at times, solitude. These conditions are rare in the modern world, much less in the classroom. But, then again, a deep inner level is rare. If we are going to cultivate it, we must be willing to go against the grain.

Study as Christian Formation

One specific benefit of the discipline of study is that it strengthens the integrity of one’s intellectual and spiritual lives as one unified whole. In Romans 12:2, the apostle Paul calls believers to “…be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect (English Standard Version). Likewise, in Philippians 4:8, Paul calls Christians to contemplate whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable and excellent. In short, Paul calls Christians to cultivate one’s intellectual life through study with the assumption that this practice brings spiritual growth.

And yet, study does not seem to be a common practice in Christian educational circles today. Christian schools offer Bible courses, organize chapels, hire Christian teachers, and lead morning prayers, but the cultivation of intellectus in their students is noticeably absent. For true Christian formation to occur, Christian educators should make time for the discipline of study. Study, when led by the Holy Spirit and accompanied with other disciplines, helps transform the whole person.

Towards an Education in Rest

At a plenary session at the Society for Classical Learning’s annual conference, Christopher Perrin argued convincingly that we need to recover an education in rest. Schools are busy and anxious, he observes, and students need relief from the chaos. In conclusion of this article, I suggest that cultivating the discipline of study is a natural first step in offering the sort of education Perrin has in mind.

While it is all too common today to blame technology as the reason for our fragmented lives and hurried schedules, the reality is that the problem is much deeper. It is moral and spiritual in nature. In this way, the problem is ultimately ourselves. We have embraced amusement as a primary approach for how to spend our time both at home and in the classroom. We have allowed the fast-paced nature of the modern world to infiltrate our lives, classrooms, and schools.

But, like all things, there is hope. God remains faithful to His people and strives to help them grow through the aid of the Holy Spirit. If we can lead our communities to cultivate the discipline of study, by God’s grace, we will see more young people become receptive to divine truth as they contemplate the deeper meanings in the world God created. Ultimately, we pray, they will come to center their minds on God himself, the Maker and Perfecter of all that is good, true, and beautiful.