By: PAIGE FOSTER
Staff Writer
In my seventeen years on this planet, there are a few things I have found to be fundamentally true: math is difficult, books are incredible, and participation is underrated. While the first two points need no explanation, the last one is more ambiguous. When I say “participation”, I don’t mean cheap plastic trophies and self consolation. I mean intentionally taking opportunities that come to you. Sometimes these opportunities are small, like raising your hand in class. Sometimes they’re bigger, like joining clubs and taking difficult classes.
My freshman year of high school, I came to El D after spending six years at a tiny, rural private school in a town thirty minutes away from Visalia. My essays were always the best and my answers were always right. Life was easy because I was comfortable. I thought it would be difficult not knowing anyone when I chose to switch schools, and I was right. I tucked my head into a book at every opportunity I got, because reading about someone else’s life was easier than trying to live my own. I stopped raising my hand in class. I didn’t partake in the musicals I used to love. I didn’t talk unless required. Somedays, I didn’t speak at all. When I look back on my freshman year, I realize that I didn’t participate in my own life. I went about my days on autopilot, allowing weeks and months to slip by in a wash of routine, leaving behind vague memories of the books I’d read and not much else.
For the last two years, I have challenged myself to participate every day. I started to hang out with people outside of school and I signed up for my first AP class at the beginning of this journey. I even raised my hand in class a couple times. Now, I’ve discovered that when I take opportunities that life provides me with, I am notably happier. Simply showing up for things, the mere act of being there, makes a huge difference in the quality of my days.
I’ll admit, though, participation has a downside. Sometimes, it hurts you. Friend groups dissolve, someone stands you up for a date, you fail a test you studied for. And because you participated, you care. But being hurt by participation is better than being hurt by isolation, because the kind of pain that comes from participating helps you understand your friends, your family, and yourself in new and more meaningful ways.
In my year of participating, I also read fewer books, but that’s okay. I was busy doing more important things. It turns out books have failed to teach me a number of things. They didn’t teach me what it’s like to receive nice notes from friends, or the irrationality of high school relationships, or how it feels to navigate complicated family issues. So take it from me: Books are great, but so is participating. I’d highly recommend them both.