Willingness
The will to keep working on school work has been diminishing over the last couple of weeks. I don't know if it was something that I did, or if the teachers did something, but I'm having trouble with homework plus the work that I do at school. Maybe the switch telling me that it's the weekend got broken, or maybe this is a sign that I should start working on my book, in case everything else goes wrong. I have been thinking about my book a lot. I'm starting to think it would be really fun. I could read other books like Harry Potter for inspiration into the style of my writing, and, I could also read other books to increase my vocabulary. I've been thinking of school too. I could even write about how the system seems to be corrupt. I'm sick one day (Don't doubt that I was.) and they either say "Sorry kid. You'll have to learn it the hard way now." or "We didn't do anything really important, so you don't have to worry about it." I don't know how everyone else did it, but maybe now my thoughts are taking the better of me. But, I'm also sort of torturing myself, because I think that everyone has high expectations for me, so I can't just quit school now. This is an issue that has been haunting my thoughts for quite some time now, so I hope you'll take my words into consideration and tell me what you think about it. (And just so you know, this started happening before Wesley came, so the game he brought wasn't the cause of this unwillingness.)
posted by gamefreak @ 5:22 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
Geoff, I think it is a very bad idea to even consider dropping out of school. You might not have to stay at NUAMES if you don't want to, but you should plan on at least finishing high school. I think that your lack of motivation is linked to your lack of sleep. You stay up really late playing your games, and then I wake you up right before we have to leave, so you aren't eating breakfast either. I think that you should start working out a time that is "bedtime" and start trying to get up early enough to eat something before we leave. I think it is a good idea to want to write a book, but I wouldn't leave school with that being my only plan. Not everyone ends up as successful as J.K. Rowling.
I agree that dropping out of school is not an option that you should even be considering, bud. Your GED is pretty much mandatory to make anything of yourself these days. (I'm not saying that's right or wrong, just that's how it is).
Chelsee has a point about breakfast too. Breakfast is BY FAR the most important meal of the day. You really should try to get up in time to eat, and if you can't and you're running late, maybe pick up (don't laugh) some power bars or something that you can eat on the way to school. The Zone bars are supposed to be pretty yummy, and they have a good source of protein, so you won't get hungry as fast. Your brain needs fuel to work, bud, and if you've gone all night without eating, you're already running on empty. You've GOT to eat breakfast.
I do think that expanding your reading is a good idea so that you can learn style and vocabulary. I've told you before that I think good reading engenders good writing. If you want good ideas for universal themes to put into your book, you definitely need to read "The Hero with a Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell. I'm not sure if mom or dad has it, but I'm sure one of them has it--I know they have it on tape, and maybe a hard copy also. If not, I know I have the book, so you can borrow mine.
I think that education is a long road, and it is sometimes hard, but it is very very rewarding. Look at me--I'm almost 28 years old, and I'm still subjecting myself to the torture. I really love learning. It makes life so rich and wonderful. Maybe try to look at it as a grand opportunity--another task to be completed--that brings you to your goals in life.
My motto for school was always this:
"Don't let school get in the way of your education"
To me this meant that classes were a useful tool to learn more about the world, but I wouldn't get too hung up on the grades. I would try to learn as much as I could and let the grades fall where they lay. I figured that the ultimate test of what you have learned isn't in the grade you make or the paper you turn in but in how you apply the knowlege that you learn.
Your English classes are a tool for you to learn how to express yourself in writing and get the most out of reading. Your history classes are a tool to gain a perspective of the past so you arn't repeating the mistakes people have made before you. Language classes introduce you to another culture and allow you to think about traveling the world. Math and Science classes show us how the world is structured, and so on.
The hunger for knowlege has to come from inside of you. Its a despirate race because all too soon the duties and responsibilities of adulthood will be upon you and before that happens you have to discover where your place is in the world.
If you think your place is being a writer, then you are in for a very difficult profession indeed!
The reality is that books are incredibly time intensive and only a handful of authors can live just on their creative imagianation and the words that they write. Most authors spend 10 years trying to bring their first book to the market. Meanwhile, people are spending less and less time reading books. And so fewer books are bought. It is a extremely competitive profession.
You've got talent, no doubt about it. But writing is not a good fallback.
Everyone else has already so eloquently said what I wanted to say to you. I'm sorry your discouraged, Geoff, but this part of your life doesn't last. You'll soon be done with school and you'll have the rest of your life ahead of you to decide what you want to do with it. School just helps open up your options. I hope things will get better for you.
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