TED Community » Melia Person

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• A reply on Conversation: School, a chance to explore or a chance to conform?

  Jan 30 2013: I live in Los Angeles. Unfortunately there are no others at my school with whom I could collaborate with, however many days I wish there was.

• A comment on Conversation: School, a chance to explore or a chance to conform?

  Jan 29 2013: CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS COMMENT!
  business( probably on etsy) and I need for the sake of my soul to get out of my own head. Look the problem isn't that I don't know what I want to do (to some degree) it's that I've got no one to back me up on this journey and I don't know if you guys know how difficult it is to try and change your life and enlighten it and be happy when you have no one to back you up. Some people have said oh you should supplement your own education, why do you think I'm on TED instead of Facebook? Someone mentioned getting the course outlines from my teachers and working ahead and that sounds exactly like what i'm going to do because that could help me a TON and I don't know why that never occurred to me, so big thanks to whoever said that! Ummm TED lover, this may sound a bit strange but is there any chance at all that I could possibly get your email or something so that we could talk even after this conversation is over because you seem to understand what I'm going through and I would appreciate it if I could have someone in like you in my corner as I start to write a new chapter in the book of my life. If not that's totally cool because I understand the strangeness of the question, but I would really appreciate it.
  Big thanks to everyone for all your comments, keep commenting and posting opinions,
  Melia

• A comment on Conversation: School, a chance to explore or a chance to conform?

  Jan 29 2013: The comments on this conversation have been absolutely amazing some of them just downright inspiring. I didn't want to pose a question and start a conversation I wasn't really going to be involved with so let's talk, shall we? TED lover, I think you are amazing and have brought up points that I can't believe someone who doesn't know me came up with. TED lover is correct in the aspect that I don't have anyone around to talk about it that understands. I have tried multiple times and failed (miserably I may add) to talk about it with my mother who believes basically that if it's so easy I need to go to school and get straight A's and come home and shut up. With my mom there is never any explaining of I can't just sit there and get straight A's I COULD but I can't because school doesn't fit the whole world doesn't fit. Just as TED lover said "It's like being a three-dimensional being in a two-dimensional world." I talk about it with my dad and I get the same results, and with anyone else you can just forget about it. At times I have considered finding a job and working for a while saving my money and just dropping out of school and simply leaving and going to the UK or something. Recently I think about that option more and more often because I need to get out of my school, my world and most importantly MY HEAD. It's like there is a little me sitting in my head giving me all of these ideas, and it's simply confusing. Maybe as TED lover as said I "awakened", I never even fathomed that thought because I still didn't know what I was going to do to generate money in my life. There were some things that I did know however, I don't fit in my world or rule it (which doesn't make sense because by all accounts I should be the Queen, Princess, Lady, Countess, Duchess and Baroness of my world), I don't fit in at school (not because I have some smarter than thou attitude or because I don't have friends, I've got loads), I want to start a youtube channel, a blog, a jewelry/clothes

• A reply on Conversation: School, a chance to explore or a chance to conform?

  Jan 29 2013: Out of of all of the comments I have read this thread is my favorite. Mostly because TED lover is actually someone who understands me, and the fact that she or he doesn't even know me just absolutely blows my mind.

• A comment on Conversation: You cannot eat money, or make clothes, or build a house out of it.

  Jan 26 2013: Ahh but alas, the people that proclaim this poverty are currently living off of taxpayer money for literally doing nothing. Therefore, why would they want to work for themselves to keep clothes on their backs, roof over their heads and food in their bellies? Also in this society money is just simply the name of the game and thats it.

• A reply on Conversation: Do you learn the basics to make it in life at school or on your own?

  Jan 25 2013: I don't understand something in your comment here, why does life set in AFTER school. Is there some kind of law that I wasn't aware about that states that life is only okay to be lived AFTER I complete school. So are you saying that in essence I'm going to spend about 17 years of my life that isn't going to count? Am I going to get credited for it later? So, people aren't going to find their passion, their soulmate, their anything in school by your assertions but you know as long as I get credited for those years later. However I do agree with the bottom few portions of your comment.

• A reply on Conversation: Do you learn the basics to make it in life at school or on your own?

  Jan 25 2013: Quite frankly I find your comment far too practical, Americanized brainwash, low on thought and absolutely ridiculous (for the most part anyway). Why should having a college degree be the first goal in life? Why is it so necessary to have a degree that frankly in this global economy is useless? There are so many Harvard, Yale, MIT grads that are on the street with no job and the jobs being offered to them are nowhere near the level that they should be. Why must I spend four years (min.) of MY own precious life inside of another school? If I don't will I not be successful? I am sick and tired of parents, teachers etc. making assumptions that they know what is best for each child and their own personal needs. As an 11th grader that has always been identified as gifted and is a member of the National Honor Society I would like to know why. Just simply why? I don't understand why it's no longer acceptable to want to adventure and experience life but it is far more acceptable to be an unhappy fat lard that sits behind a desk all day but apparently has a "happy life" or "the American Dream". This dream is apparently afforded to this fat lard because he has a MBA, spare me. I don't think these people are happy because frankly there is a whole life out there and it's just passing them by. You state that having a good education is going to provide the means (job) for an end (a life that makes me happy) and that is not necessarily true, there are plenty of happy people that never went to college or never finished and yet are completely happy. This reminds me of a conversation I had with my mum, when I told her I wanted to adventure so I wanted to go to Europe (UK, France and Italy) this summer by myself or possibly with a few friends and then before college take a gap year, and in that moment I believe she wanted to kill me, because of the way that education is viewed. Some kind of golden ticket that will give you all of your dreams, that thinking Juliette is BS, plain BS.
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  A comment on Conversation: Do you learn the basics to make it in life at school or on your own?

  Jan 25 2013: As a junior in high school, I can personally confirm that in school you are taught NOTHING. That is if you are smart, I've always been identified as gifted, placed in the honors and AP classes etc. however, there are some of my peers that struggle with things that are ridiculously simple and easy to me. As of this very moment I find myself highly bored of school, and ready to adventure. While I recognize on the whole an education is probably wonderful, I don't think it's necessary. I have just had these discussions with both of my parents, because I am trying to convince them to let me do online school. But I digress, I have about one class I learn something in and that class is Spanish HOWEVER I do feel that instead of sitting in class having a teacher drill grammar points into my head I could be in Peru or Spain and actually learning by speaking instead of simply remembering until the test and then forgetting because it is no longer of any use. Also something I believe is important to note, is that after a certain point in schooling (shall we say grade 9?) you discover if school is REALLY where you need to be for various reasons, you aren't ready for the world, you are for lack of a better term stupid etc. or if school is a place that you go because of the constraints society puts on you. In terms of society I need to be in school, I need to go to college and all of that lovely fun stuff in terms of my heart I don't feel that spending an extra year and a half in school is going to change who I am or make me more prepared for college. Socially, going to school is great I suppose however as a bit of an introvert myself I could go without out 7 out of 10 times. In answer to your question, I believe a certain level of schooling is necessary until you LITERALLY BEGIN FINDING YOURSELF which by the way school suppresses and after that you need to go adventure and make your own way.