I’m told my twelve years of public education have culminated to this: a shot at higher education – a shot at college. What does this mean? Transcripts, ‘personal’ statements, teacher recommendations, and a whole host of other supposed measures of intelligence and aptitude. A whole lot of jumping through hoops is what it basically comes down to, and I’m finding the whole process a little taxing.
First of all, there’s always this creeping feeling whenever you’re even filling out your name and social security number on the college ‘app’. You can sense it even then, the inner dialogue starts: “Come on, you’re not good enough for this school. You know it, they know it, everyone knows it.” You can hear the inner dialogue of the person reading your essay too: “What a joke… What an utter waste of sixty dollars.” Or perhaps if they are a somewhat more sympathetic judge they’ll murmur an “I’m sorry…”
Sounds harsh, doesn’t it? I think what it comes down to is that we’ve been conditioned to fear failure. We’ve been, over time, taught that it’s bad to fail, that we need to be the best we can be, all the time, one-hundred precent of the time. Granted, the message probably didn’t come from our parents — they realize we’re human. But being at a college-prep high school has made clear to me the emphasis put on the imaginary rat race.
Who cares if I don’t get accepted into UC Berkeley or NYU or CalTech? Yes, it’d be awesome if I did, but if I don’t, I don’t. I’m still not sure what I feel about the concept of fate, but if I didn’t get in, then I wasn’t meant to get in. Besides, it doesn’t matter, does it? I believe the love I give will return to me.
Take it from Jason:
I’ve never been lucky enough to find a four-leaf clover. I’ve been gifted plenty, but I never found one on my own accord down on my hands and knees. Then again, I’ve never committed to a long look. But I will admit that in all my years in this child body, whenever I found myself stooped in the grass, fingering between blades of green and those greener, I always hoped that that day’s first charmed discovery would be made by me.
In all of life, failure in the finding never got me down. The upset shows itself as a sign that that my luck would show up as something different, and perhaps a much larger version of itself. So, there was rarely a need to squander a precious moment and/or add a rare and mutant flower to the vision board.
I apply the same theory to never winning the lottery. I know I’m not supposed to get my millions for free. For this I am always eager to earn it.
There were plenty of jobs where I wasn’t hired, many of them in music and theatre. Rejection left me bouncing off of so many NO’s that I learned to be encouraged by the defeats. I found I had more talents to cultivate, more songs to write, more moxie to move. I was always complete in knowing I was moving in the right direction.
It’s that easy. Be yourself, you SuperForest-y SuperHeroes. I love you all.
With gratitude,
Chris
(Image courtesy of DDOI)
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