Lessons learned the hard way
Encyclopedia
Learning the hard way refers to the educational results developed in the process of living life, the perspective gained as a result of trial and error—more often used in reference to the mistakes, mis-steps and misunderstandings which lead to better judgment.
The phrase is also used to describe learning from one's own efforts. The idiomatic expression refers to learning from bad or difficult or unpleasant experiences.
The etymology
of this term developed in the early 1900s from craps
, a game played with dice
. An element of the game involves predicting whether the roll of dice will produce an even number. Predicting an even number is harder if the possibilities are narrowed to include only the sum of both dice showing identical values, also known as "doubles." This would mean that 2 and 2 make 4, "the hard way;" or 3 and 3 make 6, "the hard way." There is a greater probability in rolling an even number sum composed of non-matched values: as in 1 and 5 make 6 or 2 and 4 make 6, "the easy way." Statistically, double values occur more rarely, and hence they are deemed harder to roll.
The phrase is also used to describe learning from one's own efforts. The idiomatic expression refers to learning from bad or difficult or unpleasant experiences.
The etymology
Etymology
Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts in these languages and texts about the languages to gather knowledge about how words were used during...
of this term developed in the early 1900s from craps
Craps
Craps is a dice game in which players place wagers on the outcome of the roll, or a series of rolls, of a pair of dice. Players may wager money against each other or a bank...
, a game played with dice
Dice
A die is a small throwable object with multiple resting positions, used for generating random numbers...
. An element of the game involves predicting whether the roll of dice will produce an even number. Predicting an even number is harder if the possibilities are narrowed to include only the sum of both dice showing identical values, also known as "doubles." This would mean that 2 and 2 make 4, "the hard way;" or 3 and 3 make 6, "the hard way." There is a greater probability in rolling an even number sum composed of non-matched values: as in 1 and 5 make 6 or 2 and 4 make 6, "the easy way." Statistically, double values occur more rarely, and hence they are deemed harder to roll.
- Example:
- "The Saturday Evening Post said charitably that perhaps every President had to learn the hard way. (Truman might have added that that was about the only way he had ever learned anything in his life.) -- David McCullough in his Pulitzer PrizePulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
-winning biography, Truman.
Further reading
- Cooper, Alan and Robert Reimann. (2007). AboutFace 3: the Essentials of Interaction Design. Indianapolis, Indiana: John Wiley and Sons. 10-ISBN 0-470-08411-1; 13-ISBN 978-0-470-08411-3; OCLC 82287038