Day 3 An Inconvenient Mind

Something interesting happened to me yesterday: I had a meeting with my professor and we discussed the assignment I am working on. I had taken all day to structure my thoughts and questions around it, almost lawyering up internally to figure out how far I was allowed to go with my ideas. He honestly surprised me! Contrary to my expectation, he liked the strange way my mind works and encouraged me to push it further! This is unheard of for me in education.

Most teachers I’ve had through the years responded to my questions with annoyance. So, to now be asked to push this skill, something that’s essentially creativity… it made me both happy and angry at once. Happy that I finally get to lean in and angry that I need to put in work to undo years of being shamed away from myself.

If it was so clear how my mind worked even when I was much younger, why wasn’t I just guided to the matching fields and left to actually grow those strengths further?

I know this could sound like a first world problem but honestly, I think that supporting people in developing their minds should be something we all strive for, independently of the location. Even me as a German, with all the privilege of being born into an academic environment, I was shut down because I was a girl asking uncomfortable questions. I resisted what felt like oppression with all my strength, stayed defiant but it still left me extremely lonely and isolated. Because I was unwilling to pay the intellectual price in order to fit in, I just didn’t belong.

My life has improved so much since those days, by some miracle I managed to dig myself out of the hole and find people along the way with whom I have deep friendships. I cannot turn back time but I wish I could help others to not have to go through this valley themselves, or for it to at least not be so deep.

I hope you are doing well wherever you are

Celine