Now is the time of our lives to choose who we want to be. I know, I told my students that last week, right? I think it's true for them, but also for us. Middle school is the time you start deciding who you want to be. Picture it like a big maze you drop all the kiddos into and then shake and shake and shake. After two years of this, we hold it still, and watch closely to see who walks towards which exit. They're making decisions about their future, and they're starting to head in that direction. But the journey isn't over. How can it be? That maze is huge. Prior to middle school you have teachers holding your hands and guiding you through the maze, in straight rows. Yea, a few lost souls disappear down the wrong hallways, but most people make it to the goal. And then the shake happens. But even as they're walking towards to place they think they want to go, things can and will still happen to change them. You meet other people. You see things happen that change your opinion. The maze is long, and there are many right answers. At least throughout high school nobody is shaking that box, and mostly you're around the same people. College, too. Maybe you found a portal that transported you to the complete other side of the maze, but you still ended up in a crowd.
It's now, though, that matters. Not instead of then, but also. The maze seems to be thinning out. People are farther away. Some people have entered the final stages, and found the paths they belong to. It's hard not to stick together with people just because you always have. It's hard not to want exactly the same things they have. But we can't. It's time to be independent. It's time to live our lives. It's time to learn who we truly are, on our own. And maybe that's not the person you used to be. Maybe it's not what you grew up picturing. Maybe, just maybe, it's time to let go of those castles in the sky.
FALL BACK! Revised Designs
1 year ago
