My late 70s/early 80s schooling left me functionally illiterate. By embracing a poetry course from 2000 onwards, my writing improved, and surprisingly, my poor reading was ultimately a significant strength. That was through realising that painfully learned life lessons, had greater strength, than any equivalents delivered via books and/or *present* parents! Furthermore, that first-hand discoveries strengthen our broader societal wisdoms or commonsense, which is something that reiterating a second-hand thought has little to zero scope to do.
I suggest we become individuals. Please see my "I am" book, and my free essay, "No - a shortcut to assertiveness", which might be one of its helpful adjuncts? (NOTICE: as of 21/11/23, all of my near 200K words are freely viewable from this site).
Additionally, my Blog is online by definition, but I published it as an attractive physical book too. I view it as my fresh, nonfiction "Aesop's fables"!
I risked openness by sharing ideas internationally. afterwards, validations increasingly appeared because it turned out significant people had also reached my conclusions too, but most vitally, without me first knowing it (See the Gallery).