Day 1

Now that I look back, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” feels like a trick question. A question that is meant to inspire big dreams, limitless possibilities, and curiosity isn’t actually so. 

Our life’s purpose is not an individual choice. Instead, we grow up within a fully connected network of family, tribe, and city. From these entities, we inherit a myriad of duties and obligations. Most of all, we inherit a social role that comes with preconditioned standards of excellence, a blueprint that paves a clear path on what we ought to do. 

Children from the suburbs of Silicon Valley, and I assume the same for other bubbles around the world, strive to be excellent at their roles to then contribute to society in ways their environment shaped them. They are aware if they follow in the footsteps of those who came before them, walk within the lines of this path with pristine posture, they too can become excellent people. How well you walk this path becomes your identity, self-respect, and purpose - a motivation to maintain preconditioned excellence or better yet, have the ego to become preconditioned exceptional.

For those who walk a little sideways, the clear path feels like a rigid system that is functioning at the wrong pace and working against them. The education system today functions like an assembly line, and it does not stop, slow down, or move faster for anyone. “Defects” are defined by extrinsic markers like GPAs and standardized testing, and students have been so thoroughly assessed through quantitative metrics that they know whether adults have deemed them smart or not by age 7 or 8.

As each big milestone comes our way, we face a ring of gatekeepers: educators, college admission counselors, and corporate recruiters who impose a series of assessments and hurdles. Parents are merely pawns in this game, and their approval or disapproval depend entirely on how their child is sorted by a broken system. Oftentimes, parents pour their hard-earned money into predatory entities that provide lip service to mold their children into better hurdle-clearers. In doing so, we all become cogs that feed a monstrous system where quantitative metrics act as dictators spitting out harsh, binary outcomes.

The assembly line funnels good test-takers into a pressure cooker and the bad test-takers quickly become aware that society does not value them the same way. Survival within the pressure cooker depends on two extremes: how well you can keep your head down to cooperate and tolerate, and/or how loud you can be in a room full of other loud voices.

Meanwhile, the latter who simply think differently end up checking out from school and society. When this happens, family dynamics and the child’s self-esteem are among the first to decay.

However, the ones rejected by the system are the first to realize that it’s all meaningless: the numbers, gatekeepers, and hurdles. But what is supposed to be an enlightening and liberating realization ends up pushing a number of them into isolation or obsessively hunt for loop-holes and quick bandaid solutions to get to the other side. In the end, these are all inherent outcomes of the system. Unhealthy family dynamics and low self-esteem compound, and the most disheartening part of it all is their dismissal of learning - or worse, their aversion to it.

Looking at the glass half full, there is a lot someone can gain when they’ve been excluded from a sorting system of extrinsic rewards. The ones sorted into alternative roles naturally take more risks, develop a higher tolerance for failure, and experience the world in a genuine way. They pay attention to the little things and see life in layers. By using their senses in a way that most never do, they notice the nuance hidden between the lines and see what truly lies behind the labels.

For them, self-worth and identity develop along a different trajectory, and it comes through risk-taking, spontaneity, and adventure. Ultimately, they come to find what truly makes a person exceptional is refreshingly simple: fostering a strong support system, building a good character, experiencing the world, and reading.

When your purpose is shaped by genuine hope and belief for a better future rather than the symptoms of imperfect systems, you build the resilience and mentality to discover and create something new.