The School has a passionate belief in making learning relevant – and so runs courses in the important questions of everyday life. Whereas most colleges and universities chop up learning into abstract categories (‘agrarian history’ ‘the 18th century English novel’), The School of Life titles its courses according to things we all tend to care about: careers, relationships, politics, travels, families. An evening or weekend on one of its courses is likely to be spent reflecting on such matters as your moral responsibilities to an ex partner or how to resolve a career crisis.The School offers communal meals, holidays and a beautiful shop with fascinating gift vouchers and other items. It also has a division offering psychotherapy for individuals, couples or families – and it does so in a completely stigma-free way. For the normally reserved British, it must be a first to have an institution that offers therapy from an ordinary high street location and moreover, treats the idea of having therapy as no more or less strange than having a haircut or pedicure, and perhaps a good deal more useful.The School attempts to put learning and ideas back to where they should always have been – right in the middle of our lives.
The School of Life also offers "sermons" where experts talk about a wide variety of topics, such as one sermon where Tony Buzan, who claims to be the inventor of Mind Mapping (and at the very least has written a book on the subject), discusses the value of daydreaming, and how to hone your daydreaming skills (or something along those lines).
