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e_for_effort
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u24
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I missed an important life_lesson.
I distinctly remember talking to a friend at middle school, the day we got our end-of-year report cards in year 7 I think. Around age 12. Just before I went off to private_school.
We received two grades for each subject; one for effort and one for achievement.
My friend asked if I'd rather get an A for effort and a E for achievement, or an E for effort and an A for achievement.
I didn't have to think about the answer.
"A for achievement, E for effort", I said.
Little did I know then that that outlook would set the tone for the rest of my life.
It's got me where I am today: successful despite myself.
It was, and to a lesser degree still is, the source of a lot of self-loathing. It also made me lose respect for my teachers. I learned that they would be impressed even if I didn't try.
Now I realise that I am the sort of person who will try to get away with putting the least possible amount of effort in. I needed to be motivated to try harder, but I wasn't. I'm not blaming anyone else for this. It's just a fact. Nothing they tried motivated me. Maybe they didn't try very hard either, or maybe I was a hard nut to crack. By the time my grades started slipping it was too late. The laziness was burned deep into my personality.
The solution at the time was that I was withdrawn from that school and went into regular college. Where once again I was a superstar, head and shoulders above the rest. I was happier. A lot happier. My depression started to fade away around that time.
But looking back, it only reinforced this very bad habit. I didn't last long at college, soon developing contempt for my teachers, the course material and my fellow students. I dropped out with an E grade in Psychology. In fact half an E grade. I didn't even start the second year. I didn't even bother withdrawing, I just didn't go back. E for effort, E for achievement. At last my grades were a true reflection of my efforts!
I think I might dig that certificate out and frame it as a reminder. I'm not proud of any of my qualifications. All through my academic life I felt like I pulled the wool over their eyes.
Oh how I wish it were true, Émile Zola, that 'The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.'
The truth is that the gift can get you surprisingly far indeed, even with very little work.
Oxford was different. A wakeup call. I had to put the effort in there. There was no room for bewitching them with my elegant academic style. My Gods it was hard_work. I passed by the skin of my teeth. I was glad. I'd finally found my level. I was no longer the best in the class, far from it. In many ways it was like Pitsford all over again, only this time I was paying for it myself. I was motivated. Instead of giving up like I did back then, I pushed myself. I pushed myself and it worked, just about. Maybe this is the moment of realisation. I need to push myself. No external motivator will work for me.
So I'm trying to change now. I'm trying to put the effort in. I just wish I wasn't so good at getting away without it.
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140507
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epitome of incomprehensibility
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There's no E in Canada - I mean, at least where I live, the grades go illogically from D to F - but I see what you mean.
In my undergrad I took the decidedly non-tekky major of Eng Lit with a minor in music. Even the easier literature classes required effort - essay-writing ate up time, and getting nervous about assignments didn't help - but for some reason one of the music courses, Ear Training, was ridiculously easy for me. Dunno why. I sing and play the piano a bit, but I'm not a musical genius by any means, and I don't have perfect pitch. It's just easy for me to identify different intervals and chords.
In Ear Training 1 I got an A+, so I decided to take the optional (for my program) Ear Training 2 and 3 to boost my average some more. In the third course, one of our last assignments was to transcribe a short piece (that is, listen to a piece of music - multiple times if necessary - and write it out on music paper). This was a bit trickier than anything I'd done in those courses so far, and I was running late with other assignments, so when the prof asked me, "Kirsten, are you going to get the transcribing project in?" I asked him how much it was worth.
3 percent.
I asked him what mark I had already.
98 percent.
I asked him if I could just skip the thing.
He said okay.
It felt empowering, somehow, that I could afford to be lazy. Then again, that's a skill I could've practiced. I can play easy piano pieces by ear (Philip Glass's Metamorphosis 1, for instance) but I've never tried writing it down and then comparing my result with the original score. I have a feeling I'd completely mess up the rhythm. Of course, music's a tricky thing, since once you're past the realm of individual notes or note groups there's usually lots room for interpretation between what's on the paper and what's played.
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140507
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u24
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"that's a skill I could've practiced."
exactly. It's only much later that you realise the cost of your laziness.
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140512
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e_o_i
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Hmmm. For the sake of argument, it wasn't a huge price to pay, since, so far at least, I'm only doing music casually. I had to prioritize (much as I hate the sound of that word.)
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140515
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