Picking Priorities

There was a time when I would look down at the lowly "B" and wanted to shoot myself for not getting that coveted "A"--now I'm just happy when I don't fail. It's amazing how I have changed throughout the years from elementary through middle and high school to university. I guess grades have always been a huge focus in my life because, well I'm Asian American with immigrant parents. And I happen to have parents who grew up in the country side of South Korea. Like rural. When I visited my grandparents as a 4-year-old, I knew there was nothing normal about having to do my business in a pot which was located in the corner of a one-room home. Or when you have to take a bath in a giant tub with water pumped from the spigot outside. My dad tells me how he managed a farm with his brothers. Both of my parents didn't attend college which meant that I obviously had to work my ass off (or until my nose bled).

I'm starting to really get sick and tired of this grades/GPA/honors bullshit. I'm annoyed with most of my classes where the professors will just bombard me with information already in the textbook. I hate the exams/quizzes where I'm just being tested on my ability to memorize and absorb information.

Thankfully, I'm in my third year of college and have just one more year after this.

It's not that I don't like school. I love learning. I find it fascinating that there's so many things in this world I don't understand or have yet to even discover. That's amazing. But I feel like for the majority of my life in school has just been one big giant test to see how much information I can parrot back to a teacher for a grade.

Is that what education is? Really? Because I am seriously starting to regret even attending college. . .and taking on a lot of debt for a piece of paper.

I want to try my best in class and learn everything I can. Unfortunately, I can't take in the information as fast as most people and I like turning the ideas around in my head.

So today, I am going to give myself permission to not get the straight A's. I'm going to let myself ignore the GPA and whether or not I'm going to graduate with honors. That's all such bullshit. Because guess what? The people who really do care about those things don't care about the learning process. They care about looking good in front of other people and for what? To show that you can do what someone says? Right. I'll pass on that.

I've just been overwhelmed by my classes recently and I feel like I'm mostly trying to do well because I want the good grade (A) rather than taking in the information because I actually find it interesting.

Plus, there are plenty of other personal projects that I want to focus my attention on. Like losing weight. Like writing a book.

Just need to figure out a way to graduate college and find a career that will not be a life-long attachment to a mediocre part-time job.