When I was in second grade, my parents pulled me out of my first elementary school because I was "failing." I sucked at math and I had just learned my alphabets in first grade. The next year, they dumped me back into second grade at another school, not by choice but because on verbal and non-verbal skills, I was still in the second grade. I should've been in third grade. in fifth grade, my teacher told my parents that I had terrible writing skills and that my math was sub par at best. I got a horrible recommendation letter that prevented me from being accepted into a good high school. In high school, I was part of a top program for high schoolers but it was at a below-average school. That was the first time I saw true disappointment in my parents. In eighth grade*, I barely got a D on my geography final. After calculating my scores, I realized that I had really gotten an F and that I got a D because my teacher was taking pity on me.
That was the lowest point in my life and, after that, I told myself that I had to stop this downward spiral I was going through. I wanted success and I craved me. But to me at the time, it seemed like it would never come. Being my parents, they realized that my success wasn't going to happen in Australia, so then we moved to America.
Freshman year of high school in a foreign county, I got a 4.0 GPA. That was the first time I've ever seen my parents proud of me, and the first time I've seen my parents actually see my potential. As the years went by, I tried my best to keep the smile they had when I brought home a high GPA. I applied to programs in the summer, worked hard for my grades and blew off so many social invites that by the end of high school, I barely had any close friends. At my graduation ceremony, that was the first time I felt like a success. Like I made my parents proud.
And then came college. Suddenly, I'm back to square one; I still try to make my parents proud and I still try to do well in classes, but now there is way more pressure on me to figure out what I want to do for the rest of my life. The other day, my mother told me that my sister is stressed from keeping her grades up and applying for colleges. She told me that I could not possibly be more stressed than her. I scoffed and told her, "She is stressed about where she is going to school for the next four years. I am stressed about what I'm going to do with my life. I am way more stressed than she is." And it is true because college is the year where you have to strategize. You need to apply for internships in the potential career field you want. One summer in not doing that and you could be facing hardships in the end. College is like a chess game—you need to think of the consequences and repercussions of every move you make. You need to look forward and anticipate what the opposing side (in this case, companies looking to hire) wants and their moves.
I recently was accepted by an amazing internship in the department that I want. But when I finally decided to give it up, I felt like a failure. Was I cut for this? Could I really go through with this and knowing that over 50% of my job applications will come back as a "no"? The day I quit the internship, I felt like a failure. I felt like instead of moving five steps forward like everyone else had over the summer, I just moved two steps back. I felt like I had to make up for lost time, that I had to prove I am just as good as my peers.
But the next day, I woke up and realized that my one failure (in this case, not having an internship on my resume from the past summer) does not define me. That my failures in the past as I grew up do not define me. That from those failures, I learned and became a better person. I became me.
With the world of social media today, failure is not publicized. How often do you see people write on their Facebook that they got a "no" for a job application? All you ever see is what opportunities they did get. So I partially blame social media for that day of depression. But I mostly blame myself for not knowing that one failure doesn't show my true colors, for not knowing that one failure isn't going to hinder my future possibilities. I blame myself for allowing myself to wallow in my own misery when I should be looking ahead at the good parts.
Contrary to what society believes in, I have learned that accepting the failure, moving on from it, learning from it and not beating yourself over it is the best way to show the world that you are open to new possibilities and new opportunities. Life isn't all lilies and peaches; it's also bugs and rain. We just need to embrace it all.
*In the Australian school system, K-6 is Primary School, and 7-12 is high school.
