Looking Back

When I was in the 11^th grade, I had to write a paper about a magazine advertisement. I chose a Microsoft advertisement. I can't remember the complete copy of the ad. I am pretty sure it was kind of like their ads today. I am sure Bill Gates was trying to convince me that Microsoft was catchy, young, and inspirational. I am sure the ad was trying to convince me that Microsoft was just as good as Apple but with greater market share. I do remember that the bottom of the ad had something like this: "We want to thank Bob Beamon for breaking the world long jump record by over a foot in Mexico City." The idea being that Beamon's jump gave them the courage to build better Microsoft products.

I took offense to this last line about Beamon. I wrote in the paper about how Michael Powell had broken Beamon's record by a significant amount. My point being that Microsoft made itself look uniformed and lacking in the research area. My English teacher didn't like my paper much. She thought Beamon's jump held more cultural significance than I was giving it credit for. Beamon shocked the world. He proved that the limitations of humanity were illusions. We could "out-jump "our pre-conceived notions by leaps and bounds.

I didn't understand her in the 11^th grade. I don't understand her now. Some of it is age. I am sure if I was alive and alert, Beamon's jump would have meant more to me. But the problem is deeper than age and cultural significance. I hated 11^th grade. A large part of that hate was due to too much homework and me being sixteen and me playing football and throwing shot and discus. But part of it was the fact that my English teacher couldn't see that if Bob Beamon didn't speak to me then the ad had failed. She wanted creative arguments. But she wanted reflections of her creativity. She wanted honesty, but she wanted her honesty. To me as an 11^th grader, the assignment itself reflected a lack of creativity and a lack of honesty. At heart she wanted her students to see the art as well as the manipulation involved in advertising, but she wasn't going to allow a student to say "it is what it is, and Bob Beamon is not the long jump king anymore" without deducting points. She and I's subjective utility functions were not overlapping, but she "couldn't find it in her heart to get out of my way." (John Hiatt)

The point here is that the biggest mistake a teacher or a leader or a boss can make is to not recognize that people are different. I probably deserved the grade I got on the paper, but it would have meant something to me if my 11^th grade English teacher had the courage to say, "You know what; all grades are subjective." She liked some kids more than other kids. I think it would have made me a more balanced and hopeful individual if she had told me and the class this. The best teachers I have ever had told it like it was. None of them were overly concerned about grades. It was more about the ability to think and be happy in your own skin.

We work so hard to create ourselves. We work so hard to create and find a persona. It is easy to see this in celebrities and athletes. But the fact of the matter is that they are just personas. They are just something we create to survive and thrive. We find who we really are when the personas crumble, and we have to be really honest and creative.