How Sucking at School Made
Growing up on an island in Alaska was a
cool adventure, but as a teenager all I
could think about was getting off that
rock. With only 13 miles of roads, the
town just kept feeling smaller and
smaller. Many of my friends were getting
into bad habits and I might have
followed suit if I hadn?t been so
determined to get out of there. I knew
that getting into college was a sure way
out, but I had a problem.
I was never nat ural l y
good at school .
effort in their class.
attendance.
Since I was a pretty slow reader, my
English teachers helped me by letting
me know the books that we would be
reading the next semester so I could get
a head start. Many of the friends I went
to high school with breezed through
every class. It was just easy for them.
They rarely studied and got better grades
than I did (which, of course, always
pissed me off).
The kids who struggled the most in
college were often the smartest and
brightest of us all. Their problem was
that they never had to work hard at
school.
I didn?t realize at the time that the extra
work and effort I put into high school
was actually teaching
me one of the best life
skills I could have
hoped for: How to
work hard at learning.
By the time I was a
senior in high school, I
was getting mostly A?s.
This helped me get
into college. Not all of
those I applied to
accepted me, since I
bombed the SAT (tests
were still my Achilles
heel) but my grades
were decent enough
to at least get me out
of town.
In fact I pretty much sucked at school.
My freshman year of high school, I got
D?s in Science and Math, and C?s in
everything else (except PE, I always got
an A in PE). It was extra lame because I
was actually trying to get better grades
than what I was getting. I never skipped
class and I did pay attention, but school
just didn?t come naturally to me. If there
was a way to screw up a test, I did it, from
overthinking or going too slow; I
invariably did poorly.
These low grades kind of freaked me out,
once it registered that this wasn?t good
enough for most colleges. So I stopped
hanging out with friends as much and I
studied at night. I arrived early to school
to meet with my Math and Chemistry
teachers to get extra help figuring out
the assignments. I was lucky I had
teachers who offered this help, and I
found that they were eager to lend an
extra hand so long as I put forth my best
6 4
The crazy part about
col l ege?
I thought it was easy. Sure, finals week
sucked, but for the most part I
discovered that just showing up, sitting
near the front, and being engaged in the
class was a near guarantee that you
would get a B in the class. Many of the
kids in my dorm skipped class. There was
no parent around to force them to go,
and the college certainly didn?t alert
parents to their child?s lack of
High school was easy for them, and I
think college seemed hard because they
had never learned how to study or work
hard at learning.
My first year at college, I pretty much got
all A?s. I also discovered that once you
show that you can get A?s in college, you
can reapply to the universities that shot
you down before, and with a solid
college transcript you can get in almost
anywhere. Reapplying for scholarships
was also a wise move at that time,
because I got a number of them (and I
really needed them).
Becoming an Expert
Knowing how to learn new things and
adding discipline to the learning process
has shown me that anyone can be an
expert at anything. All they need to do is
study that area of interest every day for
an hour or so, and within a matter of
months they can be very fluent in that
expertise. Of course, this doesn?t apply
to all areas of life and professions. But I
believe if I wanted to be a web designer,
stockbroker, fitness instructor, real
estate coach, or whatever interests me, I
could learn how to not only be good at it,
but with diligence and the right amount
of time focused on learning, be one of
the best in my local market.
I?m a huge believer in lifetime learning. I
feel there is a direct correlation between
my willingness to keep studying and my
successes.
My Broken Indust ry