Milestone
Exercise
Positive
and Negative Experiences that Shaped My Life
Age 16: Learning to Lose
Although I did not always win in the children’s games I played with my
sister
and friends, I had never really experienced the real pain of defeat
until I decided to participate in our school poetry competition. An extremely
ambitious girl and a true perfectionist, I spent a whole month composing and
polishing a brilliant – as I thought then – imitation of a Arabic sonnet. Both
the form and the contents satisfied the strict requirements of the contest
board, and I was more than sure that my opus should strike them as a true
masterpiece. I even planned the way I would spend the monetary award after I
get it.
However, my ambitious plans were never to come true: the poetic committee
chose another contestant as a triumphant winner. No need to say, I spent an
evening in tears and a whole two weeks in total depression. I could not realize
how such a perfect poem could be rejected since for me – and for my supportive
family – it was one of the best pieces ever written in world literature. Upon
contemplation, however, I had to realize the bitter truth that tastes differ
and ideas that are appropriate in one situation barely fit another. Instead of
my old-fashioned sonnet, I should have devised a more modernistic verse for the
competition that would satisfy the tastes of the young members of the contest
board. This is how I learnt to adapt to individual requirements of different
situation – the flexibility that is vital in an educator’s work.
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