it's weird like

Her

Her

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    i'm just talking out loud about something that i've been ruminating about for the last few days

    i was always one of those kids who adults/teachers would say stuff like 'you're so smart! you have so much potential! you're going to do amazing things!' and they put me in Gifted Classes or whatever. and they'd always use me as an example of someone who could go on to do whatever they wanted bc they had the intelligence to do so. never mind that intelligence is only one component of Achieving Your Dreams, but i digress. i spent most of my early school years being treated like i was some prodigal child who was gonna change the world. which, really, anyone at the time should have seen was not a good idea.

    they thought they were empowering me and to a small extent, sure, it was good being told i was smart. but ultimately it was just endless pressure to live up to some weird standard i didn't even understand, let alone thought capable of living up to. how do you live up to seemingly endless expectations? adults projecting their hopes and goals onto me and using me as a medium to live that out, i guess. i dunno. it was very weird and it still makes me uncomfortable to think about it! i'd rather have just been left to my own devices than be championed as some Super Kid.

    anyhow, high school came along and i did great in my first year as expected.but from the second year on, there was some kind of decline and i stopped being the person everyone thought was gonna be fantastic. moving closer to mediocrity in nearly every aspect, just not caring about schoolwork or Being Perfect. dropping piano and not signing up for acting and generally wasting my talents. depression is wild, honey! it was a very noticeable decline and i don't think it's ever stopped. when you spend most of your childhood being treated as perfect, any slip is gonna be noticed. let alone a very noticeable drop from sky-high expectations.

    but then the very public and consistent reprimands started. those same people then did their best to showcase their disappointment, consistently reminding me that there was so much more i could do with myself and that i was expected to conform and make their investment worth it. the second i showed any sort of struggle and being less than perfect, the people who had spent the last ~10 years painting me as some kind of genius incarnate did a huge 180° and let me fall. once i didn't look good for them, it was like i was nothing. it was very harsh. the thing is, i never was particularly great or wonderful or even notable in the first place. i was just a kid who liked books and could talk well! it was just people trying to use an above average kid for their own means. it was cruel, if we're being blunt.

    and it really fucked me up, to be honest! i want to go back to uni, but the thought of failing there terrifies me, lol. i still feel i'm on that decline, even more so because i haven't been in any sort of schooling since the end of 2014. kinda like i've atrophied or something. i still don't handle pressure well bc i feel like if i don't do something perfectly or do the absolute best a person could possibly do, then it was nothing less than failure. so i end up not trying! it's much easier to just withdraw entirely from the concept of failure, of disappointment, if you don't put yourself in such situations. it's very hard to convince yourself of your own competence if you're so used to hearing the opposite. obviously i know that's not how one should be, it's just so ingrained in me that i don't realllyyyyyy know what to do.

    i don't know what i wanted to accomplish by talking about all this, it's just been swirling around in my head for the last week or so.
     
    It seems so often schools tell you what is best for you instead of letting you decide. Take this test, take that test, take this language, take this advanced course.

    I was forced into the wrong math classes my first year of high school, so I ended a year behind everyone else. Forced into Spanish in 8th grade, which I did horrible in, then had to take it again in 9th grade. Then they try to force the ACT down your throat, so much so that I could see the disgust dripping from the guidance councilor my senior year when I told her I didn't take it and had no interest in taking it.

    On one of my last days Junior year the art teacher I liked so much that I spent two periods in her class a day (once for actual art and the other just to help) got a call that she was being relocated to another school next year, so art was out of the question my senior year.
     
    I feel you. I was the same kid. Golden in elementary and middle school, then tarnished in high school. I still have trouble with failure. It's still hard to try new things because I worry about being a failure.

    Luckily for me (and I really can't express just how much this saved me) I had a lifeboat in the form of community college. That gave me a second chance, gave me a chance to leave behind high school completely and start over in a new environment. Sometimes a change of scenery will give you the safe feeling that you need so you can take risks again.

    The pressure though, I found that if I took more control of my life, once I started to articulate what I wanted, what my goals were, I felt like I had more control over how I sometimes felt. I didn't always feel like a failure and the expectations from other people didn't have the same control over me. I'm not trying to be some guru giving advice. That's just what my experience was.

    But yeah, I feel I was given a disservice by being told I was great all the time. It made it hard to try new things and challenge myself and I'm still being affected by that.
     
    It's a marathon not a race. I know it's weird to say but don't live up to anyone's expectations that aren't yours :)
    I get and understand what you're saying though. The moment you stop caring about what others had to say or have to say is the moment this will stop haunting you :) but also note that they said that because they know you're capible of achieving what you wanna do. Everyone struggles at something but it's the things we struggle with that should make us push forward and work harder.
     
    Spherical Ice said:
    This is why I get annoyed by people who mock the efforts by certain schools to adulate effort at the same level as attainment by claiming it's coddling or whatever.
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    Rewarding effort, especially at a young age, is probably what people in these situations needed more than anything. Replace "good job, you did well" with "good job, you tried hard." Otherwise you don't learn how to try and take risks and that's part of where this fear and immobilization comes from.
     
    I feel "participation prizes" (vocal too) is condescending and belittling of actually achievement.
     
    It always feels like any kind of pressure can kill a future. My story's different: I was gifted as well (I even helped an then-girlfriend in a different forum site with her algebra homework occasionally), and the school staff treated me in a similar vein at first, but nobody at home gave a damn over whether I could fair or not. With only one-sided encouragement, I didn't see the point in trying, so I decided to stop. I'm just a lowly community-college dropout now.

    I encourage you to try again, not because someone expects you to, but because you want to. If you want to assert yourself and kick your fear of failure square in the teeth, you'll have to come to that choice on your own. But don't let anyone size your fit for a puzzle you don't wish to play a part in. What will you do?
     
    I am I suppose. im not saying rewarding effort is bad, but rewarding success is far more inspiring.
     
    Something I noticed recently in a lot of media directed at preschool aged and smaller children recently is that the lessons are becoming more I guess realistic. Things like "be yourself and everyone will like you" are being replaced with messages like "not everyone is going to like you, but that's okay" and "try your best and you can accomplish anything" is being replaced with "failure is a thing, and it is disappointing but having the resilience to keep trying is important and respectable". A whole generation was basically taught to just work hard in school and finish college and your adult lives will be prosperous and rewarding only to left with a ton of debt and no jobs. I think the messages we're sending out to future generations are already reflecting that to teach kids how to cope with academic, social and other issues.

    I really hate when grown people shit on the idea of trying to teach the importance of participation and trying to young children. The "everybody gets a reward/special snowflake" thing is usually directed at elementary school children. It's just like, fuck off and go pay your taxes or something. They're little kids, don't worry, they probably have been exposed to harsh realities or will be soon enough. The idea is teach them not to be afraid of failure and to help build their confidence and sense of self. When they get to high school, the ones that preform at a higher level will still be the ones getting those better opportunities. I know I probably would have made a lot of very different choices as a young person coming out of adolescence with any sort of self-esteem intact and not having adopted a why bother attitude. It just looks like there's a whole movement people try and get away with behaving like bullies and assholes towards children under the guise of "tough love" and I think it's disgusting.
     
    Nuclear Chicken said:
    no need to be selfish. those who don't succeed easily and feel like a failure sometimes need to be shown that trying their best is extremely important. Frankly, the successful people don't really need encouragement or reward... Their intelligence should be enough.
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    Well, no, not that either. As a "smart kid" who often felt very, very left out because teachers over-rewarded lesser able kids who tried hard (which I'm not trying to discredit), I certainly think there's a balance to be found. The bottom line is you're dealing with the psychological development of children, there is no snappy answer but I think ideologies that ridicule praising effort only serve to hurt what I believe to be their good intentions.
     
    Nuclear Chicken said:
    no need to be selfish. those who don't succeed easily and feel like a failure sometimes need to be shown that trying their best is extremely important. Frankly, the successful people don't really need encouragement or reward... Their intelligence should be enough.
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    I feel like this merely breeds people half assing their work though. Like if you legit try and don't succeed yeah that can suck, but if "Everyone is a winner" why even try at all? That ends up causing people who actually care to have to carry everyone else and blegh...
     
    I think I am more of the opposite here. A late bloomer so to speak. I was overshadowed by my older brother throughout my childhood and teenage years as he had the better grades and athleticism. It wasn't until after university that I started to really differentiate myself from my bro.

    At any rate I had learning impediments that meant I had to take "reading recovery" lessons when I was a kid and I got held back a grade as well due to slower development. Despite all of this, though it felt I was overlooked growing up, my strict but caring parents have been pretty supportive of me.
     
    Oddball_ said:
    I feel like this merely breeds people half assing their work though. Like if you legit try and don't succeed yeah that can suck, but if "Everyone is a winner" why even try at all? That ends up causing people who actually care to have to carry everyone else and blegh...
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    supporting kids/teenagers in their endeavours and not admonishing/withdrawing support in the inevitable situation of failure is not remotely equal to Everyone Is A Winner
     
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    what the hell, I typed a crapload but it all got deleted. I try to replicate, here goes:

    I can't relate too well, but hopefully some stuff that I say will help. I smart, I was good at school etc, high school easy blah blah. Mom inflated my ego. Always thought that I could do anything if I tried hard enough (still think that) - at least in regards to stuff in academics or something, not swimming or anything like that cuz I'd die. Get to university, second term my scores were sub-optimal. I knew I got unhappy when I failed a test or something. I got pissed or sad or whatever because I can't just be better than everyone without trying, because there were people who were smart and tried hard.

    But everyone fails. You just have to bounce back. My mom was hoping I failed earlier because I could humble myself or something and bounce back earlier. Instead, I stumbled a bit in university. If you keep fearing and don't try, then your chances will indeed be slim. I'd encourage you to take up school once again, or at least do some knowledge reading. Again, I probably can't relate too well and don't know too much about your exact situation.

    Regarding "it's very hard to convince yourself of your own competence if you're so used to hearing the opposite", just don't listen to other people. Whenever people tell me crap, I usually just think "lol I'm better than you" and disregard their comment, unless it was saying something bad about my parents/family/friends. Maybe it's different because I have too big of an ego to let that get to me. But I feel like you should just ignore those types of comments, because they're really meaningless and letting them affect you just shows that they've won. Here's an ((un)related) story from my life: Once at an award ceremony, the teacher forgot my award(s), but they remembered the award for another student in my grade - my good friend and rival. Right after the ceremony, two different individuals came up to me at different times and decided to lecture me about what being smart really meant. I just stood there saying "uh huh" but I was thinking "lol what the hell are you talking about, they forgot my awards lol". (tbh I almost cried because I felt sad for myself and I kind of resented the teacher for forgetting me) Something to note is that these people were both relatively friendly to me on a normal day basis. Anyway, that experience taught me that there will always be people who antagonize you. What's even worse is that there are people who will pounce on you the moment you seem vulnerable. Once again, I don't know your situation or who is telling you these things - it might be more complex than my situation.

    have a nice day
     
    Oddball_ said:
    I feel like this merely breeds people half assing their work though. Like if you legit try and don't succeed yeah that can suck, but if "Everyone is a winner" why even try at all? That ends up causing people who actually care to have to carry everyone else and blegh...
    Click to expand...

    How did you manage to equate "adulating effort equally to attainment" with "breeding people half assing their work"?
     
    well i can only talk from my standpoint in america so uni is probably different there but ill try my best. I was always told I was above everyone else, had a better grasp, etc. i think i just developed a lot faster than everyone around me tbh. When i went to high school i was in mostly honors classes, but i chose to drop them and ultimately fade into the background. i was really depressed and i hated all the extra work and the people in those classes. after high school i didn't pursue anything for a long time for a lot of reasons.

    I finally started college last fall and i'm so happy i did. college is so much different from regular school. Really you're not expected to be anything but you. As long as you show up to class and just have you work done most professors will pass you along. I felt like until college school was just testing and making sure you can pass the test. but in college it seems like it's more about effort. if they see that you care then they'll be more lenient.
     
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