Life Lessons I Learned from Elementary School

I have decided to do a post series for the next 3 days on lessons that I've learned from different stages in my life. Before I move on to the next chapter in my life, I think it's important that I look back at the past chapters, and I thought you might benefit from my life lessons too. Plus, you seem to really like these list-y posts...

1. I'm not good at everything.

I am a member of what they're calling Generation Y, aka the Me Generation. 2 generations ago, our grandparents were the silent generation. Because of the Great Depression and World Wars, this generation was silent and were called the Silent Generation. When raising their kids, they didn't really know how to show love and encouragement in the best way (because of the hard conditions that they were raised in) and focused on success, so their kids grew up to become the Baby Boomers. The Baby Boomers grew up goal-oriented and competitive because of their harsh parents, and then they had kids. Generation Y is their kids. Kids generally do the opposite of what their parents do, so since the Baby Boomers were raised so harshly, they try to be as encouraging and loving as humanly possible towards their kids, so we are the Me Generation because we grow up being told that we are the best thing that's ever happened to this world and that we're amazing. In elementary school, I learned that I was not that amazing. I tried soccer, softball, swimming, tennis, and volleyball, and I was terrible. I had to come to the life-changing realization that I wasn't going to be amazing at everything, and sports were definitely not something that I was good at.

2. Resilience

However, not being amazing doesn't mean I shouldn't try. Being terrible at sports did not stop me from trying all of them. Every time I failed, I simply tried a different sport. I wasn't going to simply give up. Not being good at everything is not a reason to give up. Sometimes I will fail, but I will keep trying until I succeed (or in the case of sports, move on because I was never going to succeed at sports).

3. Don't do drugs.

Once a week the guidance counselor would come and tell us not to do drugs. Occasionally, she talked about being healthy or stranger danger, but even so, she would find a way to work drugs into the lesson... Stay healthy by eating right, exercising, and not doing drugs... Strangers are dangerous because they will try to sneak you drugs... etc. Drugs are bad, and you shouldn't do them. 

4. Knowledge is power.

I was in the gifted and talented program, and I had an older sister. I pretty much knew everything, or at least I knew more than the average elementary school kid, which I learned, made me really popular. In elementary school, everyone is at the point in their lives where they love knowing stuff and learning is still fun, so being the kid that could teach everyone extra stuff was really cool. In fifth grade, I would teach my classmates French at lunch. Now, if I tried to teach my friends French they would laugh and ignore me, but in elementary school, I was super cool. Since then, I've wanted to gain as much knowledge as possible, so I could stay on top. Now, I'm just that weird kid with the facts, but someday, it will pay off again! I'm just holding out for that day.

5. Have fun.

Life is fun. Don't waste your time on random un-fun things, like Spanish club every Thursday after school (especially if you don't like Spanish and plan on taking French). As you get older, you have less time, less energy, and less imagination, so having fun gets progressively harder. In elementary school, speaking French and learning to knit on colonial day was fun. Today, other people get annoyed if I start speaking a foreign language and knitting is time consuming, hard, and never turns out right. Relish every moment of fun because fun gets harder.