When I started school in first grade, I was not a socially adept person in the classroom. I was actually painfully shy, having been placed a grade ahead of my age group. But I found solace in the encouragement I received from my teachers, buffeted by comments on report cards and homework commending my intelligence and eagerness to learn. Thanks to this positive experience of mentorship, I dared to try in school...to do my best at everything asked of me. In the process, I learned the importance of taking risks: that it was the only way to grow, no matter how unnatural--how painful--it felt in the moment. You had to grit your teeth and trust that the grass was, indeed, greener on the other side of the experience. While good grades did matter to me, the extent to which I could put aside my fears and dive in became the more importance benchmark of success. (It has taken me longer to learn that we cannot measure our personal successes against those of others, for the very fact that fears differ from person to person.)
In the end, I learned that being a good student isn't about conforming precisely to a teacher's expectations. It isn't about how many As you receive. And it certainly isn't about your powers of persuasion, playing politics to bend a situation to your will. It is about returning to the same spot, every time you falter, and daring to try again.
