By TAYLOR BENNETT
Staff Writer
Growing up, we’re told how our life is going to play out. We’re told those that bully us at recess only do it because they “like us”; someday we’ll marry them and have kids. We’re told to become doctors and lawyers and to go to the best schools in the country. It’s not until our late teen years, even until adulthood, that reality sets in. You won’t get into an Ivy League school simply because you’re quirky and relatable and average at best. You won’t become a doctor or a lawyer without at least ten years of a college education, and that boy on the playground will become yet another filtered into the dangerous “boys will be boys” misconception with no repercussions. We’re told it’s okay to be different, but on whose terms? It’s okay to defend yourself when someone reaches their hands out in anger. It’s okay to try your hardest to stand out and dedicate yourself to academics, only to be rejected by your dream school. I feel that my life is a relatively decent example of this. Not a day went by in middle school without our teachers telling us that they expected big things. However, I began to build this vast misconception that I wanted to go to Harvard and become an anesthesiologist; solely based on a thought one teacher drilled into my mind. I spent three years of my life, starting at the age of twelve, manifesting that into existence. Needless to say, those ideologies have faded. I now hope to become a Clinical Psychologist and give back to the world that made me into who I am right now, despite all of the hardships thrown my way. Even thoughts of the elementary school bully and I getting married dissipated quite quickly (to his disappointment). Looking back at twelve-year-old me designing dorm rooms, I came to a realization: the tightly sealed box of societal standards isn’t as terrifying as everyone believes. There are always ways to poke holes in that box and let your true self shine through – all you have to do is try.