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Have you ever been the best in something? Anything?
Whether it was the sack race in kindergarten, the maths quiz in school or being selected for a special award, you’ve got to admit that being the best in something feels awesome, doesn’t it?
As for me, I’ve been awarded first place mainly in class rankings. Well, recently I just got first place in my class for the mid-year exam too. Maybe this is why I’m writing about this topic – it’s fresh. (I just knew my position in class and form days ago.) Now, I have no intention of showing off or anything – academics just happens to be something I’m better at. If you were to ask me about sports or dancing or art, I can tell you I suck in all three for now. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses I guess…
First time victories to me are always the sweetest. I remember the first time I got first place in something in life - in kindergarten at six years old, as we were about to graduate. When I first entered preschool at five I hated to go to school, read, play with other schoolmates, and especially write. (It’s kind of ironic that writing is now my passion…) I refused to learn anything because studying just seemed to be too hard, so I always underperformed in class, and that frustrated my teachers quite a bit. One thing I vividly remember is me refusing to go to school and my mom having to pull me with force – failing which I was sentenced to a ‘special’ corner in the house. There was one time I refused to do my Mandarin homework – my mom told me that I told my teacher I was a English girl. (What was that supposed to mean…?)
Somehow my parents used a reward approach to convince me to study – a points system where a McDonald’s meal was the award with highest value if I improved in school by finishing my homework. Both my parents and teachers at that time worked on this plan by frequently checking on my homework, especially my Mandarin homework. I remember my teacher giving me a heartfelt compliment – the first time she ever did that to me – the first time I passed my Mandarin language exam with 61 out of 100 marks.
Besides that, they also encouraged me to take part in activities such as Sports Day and the annual concert (I was dancing a dance called the Tree-Flower Dance or something, where I was dressed in green and holding large sunflowers on both hands) and make new friends every week. For that aspect, I remember Mom bringing me to class with a cardboard, asking me to write down 5 names of friends that I said hi to every week.
All that effort on our part somehow culminated in me doing better in school, and eventually led up to being the best student in the school in our final exams. I was given a nice big colourful stationary set – in Standard One I had basically pretty stationary thanks to this gift – at the end of the school year.
Back to the topic of being first. I have experienced success, but failure even more. Perhaps you don’t see it, but for every success that I enjoy, there are countless failures in other aspects that I experience. I have to admit that I hate failure a lot – I remember feeling really hopeless for failing my driving test again and again and again, and coming home from school in tears when I fail exams in school. I think at times that success can make me happy, but somehow, failure has its use – it keeps me humble and in my place, and it pushes me out of complacency to striving for improvement.
My first placing in class now is only a relative term, because the truth is that my grade point average actually dropped from the previous assessment – a failure of sorts , that is.
One last thought to ponder. How would you feel when someone else does better than you? In my case, I can’t say that I am 100 per cent envy-free when others excel or pose a challenge in something that I was supposed to be good in, and this can affect how genuinely happy I feel for that person – deep down I did wish I did better! However, it’s a fact that there will be always people that are better than me in stuff, so I guess it’s a let go and focus on beating my previous score in every aspect. Besides, competition can be real fun way of pushing myself and my competitors forward :)
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Images (other than the birthday picture, which is mine - no copying!) taken from here and here.
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