Six things I've learned ...

A year ago today, the 650 Blog began with Molly Morrison’s post “Directionless Floating.”

To mark the one-year anniversary, I first made a word cloud of all of the posts that have appeared in the blog.  See above.  The larger the word, the more often it appears in the writing.  Is it any wonder that "school" and "life" are so big?  After that, I went back and read all of the posts with a notebook at my side. I was looking for themes, motifs, common issues and concerns. What follows is a highly subjective list that amounts to “Six Things I Have Learned” from a year’s worth of 650 blog entries. The blog already contains some good lists of this sort: Lauren Lilly’s “Five Things I Thought in High School that Turned Out Not to be True” or Alex Deddeh’s comical “Six Ways to Succeed in College,” or Alex Santiago DiBiaso's “Go All In.” This is my list, what I have learned, and it is complete with links to the referenced posts for anyone who wants to pop around the blog and reread some great writing.  

First, a few numbers:

Total number of posts:  54

Total number of pageviews:  49,742

Posts by gender:  Female 32, Male 21, Gender nonconforming 1

Posts by graduation year
2016: 11
2013: 6
2015: 5
2014: 5
2018: 3
2017: 3
2012: 2
2010: 2
2008: 2
2007: 2
1993: 2
2011: 1
2009: 1
2004: 1
2002: 1
1999: 1
1998: 1
1997: 1
1996: 1
1995: 1
1994: 1
1982: 1

Organizing the 650 Words blog has been a true labor of love for me. I love reading new pieces when they come in; I love hearing from my former students and marveling at their wisdom; I love laying out the posts, selecting the pictures, and writing the intros. Where the project is going is anyone’s guess. During the first few months I had a backlog of posts. Nowadays, a year into the project, I get a post shared with me once every few weeks.

Still, though, I’m hopeful it will continue -- because the number of people who have said they WANT to write posts but just haven’t gotten around to it…. THAT number is really high. I am going to forget someone on this list, but here are a bunch of people who fall into that category: Kate Finster, Khaleel Jenkins, Augie Colachis, Alex Shibanoff, Kiernan Aiston, Cianna Platt, Alex Nicita, Stephen Gonzalez, Eric Taylor, Jared D’Onofrio, Matthew Tannenbaum, Brian Sullivan, Chris Ammon, Kaitlin Garza, Bob Drakulich, Julianna D’Auria, Lauren Clark, Andy Kim, Sara Yellen Sapadin, Caroline Watts, Sara Gothard, Bizzy Lincoln, Sasha Hammad, Morgan Smith, Charlie Newhall, Laura Katz, Jocelyn Silver, Shannon Partrick, Richard Klausner, Lisa Rapallo, T. J. Tallie, Jessica Roake, Ted Sullivan, Carlos Ezquerro.

There are others I’m forgetting. But add up even half those names and you’ve got another year’s worth of the 650 Words blog! Let’s go!

I apologize in advance if these bits of wisdom seem like garden-variety self-help suggestions (how many times can you be told to live in the moment?), but I have tried to freshen them up with links to the personal stories found in the posts and some of my own observations.  OK, without further ado, here it is:  Six Things I’ve Learned from a year of 650 Words.  All of the accompanying visuals are photographs of pieces of art that are hanging on my classroom walls.

- C.H.

1. Stop comparing yourself to others.
Right now. Just stop.  Of course it is easier said than done, but as I see it, this is the common issue that links many of the posts on the 650 blog. It is what Simone Tift is writing about directly (“Finding Your Stylish Blinders”); it is at the core of the perfectionism that haunted Natalie Schmidt all through high school (“Escaping the Prison of Perfection”); it is why Isabel Sanchez Hodoyan (“Doing More, Being More”) feels like she can never do enough; it is why Olivia Ghosh felt like she could never be thin enough (“House of Cards”). Comparing yourself to others in unhealthy ways is the root cause for all manner of bad stuff, from depression to body image issues to cripplingly low self-esteem.

(Is it worth noting that all of the people listed above are female? Is it worth pondering the gendered nature of the social cues we get from an early age? Is it worth wondering aloud why girls seem so much more susceptible to the Comparison Virus than boys? I’ll let you all think on this. Maybe someone will write about it.)

To keep these kinds of comparisons from having power over you is a step toward personal strength -- or so it seems to me. We live in a world that is constantly encouraging us to compare ourselves to others. The first day we enter school we look around and wonder who we are in relation to the kids around us and why some win awards and why others are effortlessly popular. And while we would like to think that this tendency to compare disappears in grade school, the truth is that it only gets worse as we get older. It is often the case that kids -- especially girls -- are more confident at 12 than they are at 16. In a consumer culture, of course, media fans the flames of this phenomenon. Advertisements ask us to buy this or that product so that we might be more like the beautiful people depicted using it. Facebook and Instagram feel like a mass conspiracy to make us feel shitty about ourselves for the boring lives we are leading. It is little wonder that we would look around at the people we admire and ask, Am I smart enough? Am I caring enough? Am I happy enough? Am I woke enough? Am I a good enough Mom? Dad? Student? Daughter? Son?

But while these kinds of comparisons might come naturally, we can control our responses to them. We decide how much we will be swayed by real or imagined successes of the high achieving people around us. We decide if we are going to define ourselves on our own terms or based our imagined shortcomings as we compare ourselves to others. It is unrealistic to think that we can completely stop comparing ourselves to others -- but it is very realistic to make a conscious effort to define ourselves based on what we are rather than what we’re not (see Louisa Frahm’s “Confessions of a Floater” or Colin Grey’s “For the Love of Something”). Emerson said it this way: “It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.” The sentiment soars above its sexist language: “great” people have little use for comparisons because they are too busy being whoever it is they are.

(Drawing by Giselle Alota)

2. Take Smart Risks
The willingness to take risks is often pointed to as a key to mental, emotional, and intellectual growth. Certainly this has been a theme in the 650 Words from the beginning. Whether it is Kyra Ghosh going to Indonesia (“Searching Beyond Borders”) or Theresa Sgobba telling us to follow our bliss or Jeremy Kahan heading to Israel without a plan (“Embracing Risk”) or Alexandra Santiago DiBiaso telling us to “Go All In,” the connection between taking risks and greater self-awareness has been demonstrated time and again. Even the more practical posts -- like Vanessa Otero’s “Learning How to Adult” and David Israel’s “Tend Your Garden” -- put a high premium on putting yourself out there.

I struggle with risk-taking sometimes. I believe in a growth mindset on an intellectual level, but often find myself falling back into the same patterns and ways of thinking, especially when it comes to teaching. It is a constant battle: tried and true vs. new and unknown. I will say that some of my most memorable teaching moments in the past ten years or so have come when I have pushed myself to do something different, creative, and original. It is not possible or advisable to reinvent your approach to your job every year, but it absolutely worth it to push through the boundaries of your thinking into new and unknown territory.

On a different level, I wonder: Is risk taking the domain of the privileged? If you have safety nets under the safety nets, is walking on a tightrope really a risk? Is this one of the greatest privileges of coming from a financially secure background? The ability to take bigger risks? Another great topic for someone to write about!

For many of us, playing it safe is a natural inclination -- we gravitate toward ways of seeing, ways of thinking, ways of living that are risk-averse. I love going hiking, but I tend to hike in the same places. I love teaching literature, but I gravitate toward the same books. It seems to me that the Risk Averse Inclination has its own kind of gravity, too (see Meghan Babla’s piece, “The Formidable Force of Change” for some great advice on this). Even when you think of ideas that are new and exciting -- new places to go, new courses to teach, new books to introduce into the curriculum -- the gravity pulls you back. It happens in big and small ways, and the net effect is that the gravity is pulling you back to a certain comfort level. Some of this is OK, even preferable, because “tried and true” can be a good thing. But this tendency can also lead you down a barren and dusty path, where nothing feels vibrant and lush and growing. Avoiding embarrassment is intimately connected here because the unwillingness to take risks, the shelter of a fixed mindset, is driven by a fear of failure. You don’t want to “look bad,” so you stick to something that is tested for success (for some great advice about dealing with rejection, see “Daring Greatly” by Rachel Bruno or “Investing in Your Most Important Relationship” by Morgan Oberstein). But as you stick to it, something else sticks to you: resignation, disillusionment, self-reproach. It’s like a great tradeoff: you live without the risk of failure, but by doing so you give up all possibility of growth.

As for the “smart” part, I would only say that everyone is going to evaluate risk in different ways. One person’s smart risk might be another person’s stupid risk. It’s just important to do the math, even if it is highly personalized, highly subjective math (Cass Lichtman addresses this beautifully in “The Voice Inside”). Quick relevant story: at a Parker reunion event last year, I ran into a former student who was a big fan of the 650 Words blog. As a student, he had been a hard-working high achiever, but in the adult world he was having a hard time meeting his career goals in his job. So he quit. He gave up a safe and well-paying job to pursue a much less certain opportunity in another city. Maybe those inspiring blog posts about the importance of risk-taking -- like “The Heavy Weight of Expectations” by Molly Lavin or “Writing Our Own Stories” by Rachael Abernethy or "Gaming for Life" by Chris Newsome-- got him fired up! I’m not sure how his risk panned out, but I am writing this here in hopes that he sees it and shares his experience with the 650 Words community.

Ultimately, what I’ve taken from the 650 universe is this: be thoughtful and open-minded as you make decisions about your life (check out Scott Schneider’s post, “The Best-Laid Plans”). If you are choosing the safe route, own it and know why you are choosing it. If you are choosing the risky route, know what you’re risking and why you are risking it. Having honest conversations with yourself might be the most important thing of all.

(Image: a visual representation of "Dead Poet's Society")

3. Let People In 

For those people reading who are extroverted and open about everything happening in their lives, it may seem silly to see this listed as “advice.” Of course you let people in! Why would you keep them out? On the other hand, for the more introverted and private among us, this might be the mantra you need to write on your hand and look at every hour to remind yourself of its importance.

This becomes the problem when you start thinking too much about self-awareness, self-maintenance, and self-determination. All of those start with “self,” and it’s no secret where the slippery slope leads: self-absorption.

I don’t have it written on my hand, but I often have to remind myself to let others in. The poet David Whyte begins his poem “Everything is Waiting For You” with a line that always grabs me: “Your great mistake is to act the drama as if you were alone.”  I suppose you could argue that on some deeper existential level we are all alone, but the problem with living too much in your head is that you miss all manner of opportunities to connect with others.

And as we have seen in the 650 blog, connecting with others is one of our greatest sources of salvation. We’ve seen a good number of posts -- Victoria Ralston (“Allowing Yourself to Breathe”), Henry Aceves (“Coming Out as Trans in High School”), Olga Livshin (“When I Translated Russia into Purple Socks”), Wolf Recht (“The Perilous Escape”), Lakme Caceres (“Don’t Let Yourself Get Comfortable”), Rickey Leary (“The Well-Crafted Mask of Normalcy”), Lydia Fisher (“I’m Full for Now”) -- that make the case for the importance of opening the vault and letting people in.

Of course the world of literature offers up some powerful and memorable reminders as well. Our old friend Holden Caulfield offers us a nice metaphor to understand this problem (sorry Nick Miller). As he wanders around New York City, he sometimes steps into phone booths, shuts the door, and walks out 20 minutes later not having called anyone. Salinger offers this up as a kind of tableau, a symbolic snapshot, of the problem of alienation. Holden wants to reach out and connect with people, but he has built walls around himself that make it impossible for him to do so. His answer, and his first step toward improved mental health, comes when he decides to let people in (Phoebe, Mr. Antolini, and ultimately “this psychoanalyst guy” at the unnamed institution). Holden, of course, is only one of the thousands of examples, in literature and film and real life, of people whose journey toward self-acceptance and self-awareness is keyed by a willingness to let people into their inner worlds.

(painting by Pedro Gallardo)

4. Be the Apostle of Wow

I’m not sure who coined the term, but it was used in reference to Neal Cassady, the Beat Generation icon who, among other things, inspired Jack Kerouac to write On the Road. Cassady is probably not a good role model, then or now, but he did showcase the kind of high-octane, hyper-positive, all-in approach to daily living that appeals to me even as I struggle to get there myself.

Everything, now and always, starts with living in the moment. Much of the self-help industry is built around this notion of Embracing the Now because we live in a world where it becomes harder and harder every day to hack our way through the distractions to find the moment. A number of the most powerful posts in the 650 blog have made the case for the importance of embracing this elusive Now as well. If you need some lively and powerful reminders, go back and read Uthara Vengrai’s post (“Win the Day”); or Remi Mooney’s story about her father (“I Never Thought I Would Say this at 22”), or Kelly Clemeshaw’s story (“Well, shit…”) or Grayson Lang’s post-graduation poem (“Four More Years”), or Gavin George’s call for simplicity (“Stepping Outside Yourself”). In unique and highly personalized ways, all provide powerful reminders of the benefits of honoring something or someone with our full attention.

But it’s a battle to get there. Perhaps this is why so many people pursue hobbies and passions that force them to slow down and pay attention. Read, for instance, Ginny Robinson’s wonderful piece on quilting (“FailureCraft”), or Jimmy Thompson’s piece on the embracing the wildness around and inside us (“Embrace the Wild”), or Hannah Ostrow’s tribute to reading (“Reading Life”). And if that’s not enough, feel free to check out my bit on Zen birding (“Practicing the Art of Paying Attention”).

Whether it’s the Apostle of Wow or Now, the larger point reverberates all through the 650 blog: presence will set you free. The great Toni Morrison, who just recently passed away, said it nicely through her character Guitar in Song of Solomon. “You got a life?” Guitar asks Milkman, who is in a rut. “Live it. Live the motherfuckin’ life.” Good advice!

(Image:  Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady)

5. Learn for the Right Reasons 

A good number of the posts in this space are tinged with regret -- people looking back at their younger selves and wondering, Why was I like that? Nowhere is this more prevalent than in attitudes toward learning. Check out posts like those by Alex Frachon (“Just Read This”), Sam Bagheri (“The Plentiful Buffet”), and Milan Marrero (“Carrying the Fire”). All are smart and successful young men who look back at their time in high school, shake their heads, and regret not taking advantage of learning opportunities that were there for the taking. To borrow Sam’s metaphor, they turned their collective backs on the plentiful buffet.

(Is it worth noting that all of the posts referenced above were written by young men? What should we make of this? Another topic for someone to write about!)

The lesson here is pretty straightforward -- take advantage of your educational opportunities. But I think there is some commentary embedded in these posts about the reasons why we learn.

It’s OK to be rebellious in high school. It’s OK to push back against the worst aspects of the prep school experience: stress, anxiety, pressure, perfectionism, academic competitiveness. Many of the posts on the 650 blog demonstrate how corrosive these influences can be. But don’t rebel against learning. Don’t let rebelliousness slide into lazy mindedness. Read books. Pursue intellectual passions. Follow your curiosities. Not because you have to but because you want to -- because you recognize that spirited learning will give you more perspective on yourself and the world around you.  If you missed Tim Barry’s post (“Deconstructing the Caterpillar”), go back and read it. Encased in his butterfly imagery, Tim makes a good case for the importance of learning -- not for the grade, not for the college acceptance letter, not for your parents, but for yourself.

(painting by Trinity Fima)

6. Accept Yourself Already

If there is a leitmotif to the 650 Words blog, this might be it. Self-acceptance. That moment when you stop fighting against it, put down your weapons, and allow yourself to be whatever it is you are. Read Dr. Wilson’s beautiful story about his journey (“Dis-covering”) or Nina Ochoa’s radical acceptance of her high school self (“Dancing in the Dirt”) -- you’ll get the idea. As a teacher who puts self-reflection front and center in his classes, it was particularly heartening to read these tales of self-acceptance written by my former students. I cheered when I read about Henry Aceves’ Whitman-inspired embrace of his true self (“Coming out as Trans in High School”). I marveled at Alison Carey’s recognition that it was OK to love herself for exactly who she was (“It’s Okay”). I was right there riding with RB Ganon on his long bike ride to avoid loneliness (“Insisting on Yourself”). I smiled when I read about Ashley Davis accepting her hair (“All of My Hair and All of My Selves”), Katherine Dews embracing her story as a mixed-race girl (“The Unapologetic Embrace”), Reece Salmons stopping “the charade,” Kai Perket accepting their sexuality (“The Power of Self-Definition”), and Sammy Rodriguez being himself in a world that seemed like another planet (“Easy to Hide but Difficult to Ignore”). And I was so proud of Emma Moore for being searingly honest with herself in her piece (“My Honest College Essay”), which still stands as the most-read post on the blog (3670 page views).

There’s a built-in conundrum here. Are the ideas of self-improvement and self-acceptance in conflict with each other? If you accept yourself as you are -- “I exist as I am, that is enough” (Whitman) -- does that prevent you from pushing yourself to be something more? Sometimes I think people will use self-acceptance as a kind of crutch. They will tell themselves “I’m not the kind of person who…” to authorize themselves to NOT do something that at some level they actually want to do. Timidity masquerading as self-awareness!

On the other hand, maybe self-improvement isn’t actually changing yourself -- maybe it is just reclaiming the person that you really are, the golden you behind layers of social constructs and psychological hangups. Now that is an act of radical self-acceptance! In this sense, the entire project of “self help” is really nothing more than a huge reclamation project. Reclaim the Golden You!

One of the things I have gleaned from all of these wonderful essays is that true self-acceptance means accepting all of the different aspects of yourself. Not the single monolithic capitalized Self--but all of the little selves that make up our messy identities. As Whitman says while watching some birds circle in “Song of Myself”:

I believe in those winged purposes,
And acknowledge red, yellow, white, playing within me.

Here’s to those winged purposes and everything playing within us.

(painting by Pedro Gallardo)