When looking back at my experience
within school I can see that it was as though it did not matter how hard I
tried, it did not matter how much time I spent studying – I still just couldn’t
make it, it wouldn’t ‘pay off’. After a while I started to see it as useless, I
mean – why should I even try when it does not pay off. I realized that whether
I would study really, really hard or wouldn’t study at all – I still got the
same results. I was ashamed and disappointed at myself, because I worked so
hard and put so much effort into studying but I was not good enough anyway. I
drew the conclusion that if I wouldn’t study at all, if I just gave up and
pretended as though I didn’t give a fuck – then at least it would be ‘my decision’
to get bad results, then it wouldn’t be an outflow of my inadequacies but
rather just a conscious decision to not care.
And so now I see that this was what
I actually decided to do. I had for many, many years worked so hard, pushed
myself so extensively and I still got the same feedback; it’s not enough. I
could not do more than what I did, I just couldn’t seem to mold myself, adjust
myself and align myself with what was referred to as ‘a good student’. In the
end it is not your effort, how much time you dedicate, or how hard you try that
gets graded – but rather the scores you get on the exams.
We had these evaluations where you
sat down with your parents and the teacher and got feedback on how you were
doing. It always felt like an execution. Every semester I studied as much as
one could possibly do but I still got negative feedback, it was still not
enough – what was I supposed to do? I see how I would immediately and
unquestionably just accept what the teachers said and in that trusted their
evaluation to be what determined my self-worth. I never even considered looking
inside of myself and question what others said about me, or realizing that it
was not even about ME per se, I mean it was not my self-worth that was being
evaluated – instead I would just absorb it and define myself accordingly, where
I would form the belief that I am a failure no matter how hard I try. And so
after a while I decided to become what I perceived others to think of me –
where I deliberately stopped trying and pretended as though I did not care
anymore. I mean, it just seemed easier to take the negative feedback if I had
made a deliberate decision to not work hard.
- I forgive myself that I had accepted
and allowed myself to define myself according to the feedback I got from the
teachers as a child – where I immediately, instantaneously and unquestionably
just accepted and absorbed the teachers opinions of me and my ‘performance’ –
not seeing or realizing that they were merely just commenting on and pointing
out how I did externally in relation to my ‘performance’ and in that assessing
whether the knowledge I possessed were aligned with the instructions that they
had in relation to what a student of my age should be able to pull off, that it
was not an evaluation of who I was or my self-worth – and so I forgive myself
that I have, within and throughout my life, accepted and allowed myself to
automatically assume and take for granted that the opinions other people have
of my external performances defines who I am, and so thinking and believing
that I am not good enough as who I am if other people form negative opinions of
my external performances – not seeing or realizing that opinions does not
determine or define who I am – therefor I forgive myself that I have accepted
and allowed myself to shape and mold myself according to my perception of
others opinions of my external performances – instead of seeing, realizing and
understanding that after all I am the one that ultimately determines who I am,
how I experience myself and who I am going to be in relation/as a response to
others opinions – and so I see, realize and understand that I have the ability,
the capacity and the responsibility to decide who I am going to be and what I
am going to accept and allow myself to define myself by and according to – and
I am therefor responsible for who I am in relation to other people’s feedback,
where I see and realize that when another person makes an assessment of my
performance, it is not in any way an assessment of my self-worth or self-value.
- In this I commit myself to see,
realize and understand that no matter what opinion I perceive another person to
form of me – I am still capable of deciding who I am going to be in relation to
that, where I see, realize and understand that I have the ability, the capacity
and the responsibility to decide whether I am going to absorb or question –
whether I am going to let perceptions I form in regards to what another person
thinks of me/my performance to decide how I am going to experience myself or
not. And so therefor I commit myself to, when and as I see or perceive it as
though another person forms an opinion of who I am or my external performances,
start question what comes up within the mind as a response to my external
situation – and within that stop the automatic pattern of just absorbing and
just taking it – to instead within me say ‘wait a minute, is this really
something that I would want to experience myself as?’ – and so within that I
direct and decide for myself who I am – where I no more accept and allow myself
to just blindly and automatically ‘take it’ – but to instead question it and
realize that I am ultimately the one that decides how I am going to experience
myself – so why would I want to make myself feel like shit through taking other
people’s opinions personally, when I could instead actually decide to stop, to
not accept or allow myself to go there in the sense of taking it personally but
to instead decide, in that moment that no, I don’t want to make myself feel
like shit anymore – from now on I decide.
To be continued..
