Imagine being offered a task, and by working hard you would be rewarded with $1000. However, out of your group of 26, only 24 could receive the reward. It depended on your skill, your attendance and how you worked as a group. You had been working meticulously, attending every meeting, working on your own time, helping others, even sacrificing other commitments in order to meet expectations. Finally, judgement day arrives and despite working extremely hard, you realize that you have been chosen as the 2 who don't receive the prize. You are told by your boss, "It's not your ability that's the issue. It's just that with half the people in your section that are seniors and are likely to leave and miss this experience, yeah, I had to choose you." (And yes, he left it hanging somewhat, unwillingly to reveal the ugly truth.)
Yes this happened today. But what this was, was being cut from performing for a competition on one of the songs. As one who tries her best to be socially correct, I shake it off with a laugh and exit the room coolly, not making a big fuss, quickly accepting this fate I had been assigned. Afterwards, though, came the contemplation. My mind was like ground zero after a hurricane had furiously destroyed all existing thoughts. What could have possibly resulted in my removal from the choir? My mind was in ruins because I was not used to this. I was decided as the worst choice and removed. Other than softball (because I am less athletically inclined), I have rarely ever been eliminated or picked as the last resort or selected as the worst. So I narrowed down the reasons. Perhaps I had bad vowels? Perhaps I had bad technique? Perhaps I had bad breath support? Perhaps I was so quiet that it didn't matter if I was there or not? I didn't know the answer. To me, I've never seen myself as amazing in anything. I have never been the top for anything so I wouldn't consider myself good at all. Perfection would be the goal. I blame this perfectionist attitude I have as a result of influence from my parents, for I have never received much praise from them at all because I have never been the best. Then after looking fault in myself, I began looking fault in others. Personally, I was maddened because I was sure I had put in so much more effort in practising than many of the others in my section. Furthermore, some of them had even complained to me and skipped practices, or simply take any small excuse as a reason for skipping practice. On the other hand, I have skipped softball practices everyday in order to come to practices. But as the situation reveals, I doubt any of the sacrifice I've made actually paid off. I didn't need to be there. It's not like I was unable to sing the songs right. I had it memorized and everything. The other reason which infuriated me was that some people, when asked to sing alone (which tested their individual memory/skills) for their own part, actually forgot the lyrics and disappeared in the middle of song, due to their incompetence. I hadn't forgotten any lyrics. (And anyway, the individual performance probably didn't influence his decisions for this removal) I did fairly well. But no, I'm the one who gets cut.
Other than me, there are 6 spots for people to fill as alternates, which would be the euphemistic way of "You have not met expectations in a certain way, so you're not needed." A girl had been taken out of 2 songs due to her bad attendance while the 2 other boys, as I have observed, were weaker singers. This just narrows down the possibilities of why I was cut to one reason: I was lousy and my skill wasn't enough. No matter how he may try to sugar-coat it and claim that he may have randomly picked me, I'm sure I wasn't good enough, and that just brings me down. I can say firmly that I have been working hard in terms of training my voice and things, but no matter how hard I try, nothing seems to be working. It's the same for softball as well. I feel like I would never be great.
For me, it really honestly does not concern how hard I work. Because I always work extremely hard, and I even have confirmation from teachers and others.
I've come to conclude that a new saying that can be added to my list of hated motivation quotes people say would be: "Hard work (or the process) is more important than the result." This quote is basically crap. No one cares how hard you work, they want you to work fast, smart and produce excellent results. Even if you fall a thousand times in practice and get up to work again before going on the field to play a game and you unfortunately allow 3 runners to home-run, no one is going to tell you that it was fine because you worked hard. If you go out to work one day and you lose a whole project, your boss isn't going to tell you that everything's fine because you had worked exceptionally hard. No one, is going to tell you that in fact.
I'm so done. I skipped homework to write this and I would definitely continue to rant for hours but the sleep pangs have begun to hit and I need to sleep.
And again, I bet this year's birthday is gonna be plain and boring because no one bothers to remember.
Other than my petty complains, I hope that you the reader are having a good time. And if it sounded formal, it was supposed to haha I was trying to write this like a super ap english kind of recount.
Anyways,
Good night and I hope your life is going better
Sherlyn
