Theater and education: the art of perseverance

Maybe my story is not surprising at all. I believe there are lots of cases like mine in all parts of the world, even more prodigious and with clearer results. However, I am certain that my case has something particular. My life has always been built on the basis of small crossed threads, like tiny and invisible fibers that between the shadows, have formed, since I was born, a destiny parallel to the one I live.

I will explain:

Many times, human beings are unable to see our capabilities. In reality, much of what we call ignorance is nothing more than the inability to access tools and knowledge that provide us the opportunity to understand the many truths hiding in the world and discover what we are really good at. This binds us to do with our lives what by dint of custom we perform daily, or what our parents have done for their whole lives when reality could be very different.

Throughout my life I was a young man quite indifferent towards most things. Apparently, nothing at school managed to capture my attention. I learned to read at eight-years-old, my high school average was always less than 12/20 and I never knew that the university existed until it was too late. In general, I always believed that my future was subject to the circumstances of the present, to what happened at the moment and never to my own effort. However, this indifference was contrasted with a genuine passion born of that world hidden by the shadows of ignorance. A genuine desire to learn was hidden within my will. In a self-taught way, I investigated and followed with a passionate fury what captured my interest even though my economic condition and social stratum told me again and again that I should concentrate on "objectives" according to my place and situation.

These two realities crossed each other over and over again, weaving a world that constantly clashed between dreams and impossibilities, between capacities and deficiencies: a world of wanting and not being able to.

It was precisely that duality that had accompanied me throughout my life because although I was apparently a young incapable person, in reality, I had been building a genuine vocation through my research. Then, when I reached sixteen years of age, those two worlds merged and gave me a slap. All my talents, which had been formed thanks to an ingrained character to ignore absolutely everything that was denied me, were unable to advance because I had neglected the value of my notes. The admission to the university was denied me for two consecutive years and I simply consumed myself in one of the most painful feelings that can be experienced: rejection.

Being rejected is probably one of the most interesting feelings that I have had to live. On the one hand, when you have a rebellious nature, rejection pushes us to duplicate the effort and awakens a powerful desire to demonstrate who we really are. However, this feeling is mixed with an icy shadow that clings to the body and makes us absolutely doubt everything. We even ask if as individual beings we serve for something. The sensation can be terribly painful because it pushes individuals to rethink absolutely everything, even if they have a talent or not.

Particularly, education worldwide tends to promote rejection. In fact, I could say that modern education institutionalizes rejection. Regrettably speaking about this issue is to fall into fallacies since building a different system requires a deep knowledge and a visionary perspective of the direction that societies should take in relation to their future. Therefore, I can only speak of the present and, unfortunately, the present is exclusive; and it is exclusive because the system is configured to be that way—in reality, it needs it. It needs to systematize, segment, and divide the knowledge in such a way that a mechanical selection process can be carried out that measures certain standards and not the real value of the individuals. But leaving this powerful problem, at seventeen I was submerged in a mild depression that, thanks to the duality that hid in my soul, I could canalize the frustration and turn into opportunities.

One of the most difficult skills to acquire is to canalize frustrations towards other dimensions. That is, using frustrations as bridges to analyze us and move forward. Because, frustrations can be harmful or very positive; everything depends on the way in which it is raised and studied. In my case, that accumulation of setbacks and failures could have led me to accept that my intellectual, economic, and social condition was not designed to allow me to enter university. If I decided to take that option, I simply had to redirect my life towards a path according to my condition and live, surely, under the frustration of "what could have happened." However, do not act like that.

During those two years, my depression pushed me to form myself intellectually. I read without stopping, I had an infinite rage inside me. Rage against the system, against my situation but, especially, I was angry at myself. Everything was my fault and I had to pay for it, so I assumed it and started to study, to listen to my passions. I stopped worrying about money, about society, or about what the future could hold for me. For the first time, I started to be genuine and sincere with myself. The more I read, the closer I got to that hidden future in the shadows. Each book was a tool that allowed me to understand my situation, each author presented contexts similar to mine and then, one day, I found one of the most valuable lessons of my life.

If you think about it, dear reader, our reality is a great theater play. We all have many roles at the same time which we represent for the people who know us and we decide our destiny through the actions we carry out in our home, at school, or at work. Life is a great show and the best actors are those who stop believing that they act and go on to internalize the character to such a point that they forget their fears, their own insecurity passes to another plane, and they become what they believe with sincerity. They become in the character.

I think our reality is not very different from a theater play. With one exception: we are given the opportunity to decide which character we want. We build, every day, who we want to be; we are never imposed. However, once we define our desire, the time to understand this philosophy becomes.

When I was eighteen-years-old, I began to reflect on this fact. Human beings can do incredible things when we believe in it, when we overcome the barrier of our prejudices and decide to believe in what we do and in ourselves. As well as the actor who stops "acting" to "be," so too, people believing in themselves cease to be mere humans and become men and women who transmit security, trust, integrity and, especially, determination. I sincerely believe that the trick of success lies in locating what makes our heart beat hard, that something that makes us feel safe and proud of our effort and, from that moment, believe the role. Believe that we have something different, something powerful that deserves to be shown. If we believe that we have a unique and valuable capacity we can tear our soul by pursuing that passion.

That is exactly what I did. My passion was writing and knowledge. That is why I devoted myself to study and write, to look for the necessary tools to be better every day in it and to show the world that parallel destiny that I had always been working on inside me. Thanks to that, after two years I entered the university, I got a scholarship for academic honor and I have maintained an average of 18.40 for three years. After my depression, my loneliness and my frustrations, I understood that life was reduced to being honest with myself. Understand my reality, recognize what I am passionate about, see if I really had the skills to tear my soul in the name of it and to assume the consequences and the advantages. Then everything comes down to perseverance because the final result of finding myself was acquiring the ability to persevere. Only with perseverance and constancy can talent be polished and build the best version of our capabilities.

Therefore, dear reader, the best decision will always be education and assume every decision you make. It is not simply a matter of believing that one has the capacity to do something, it is necessary to assume it, internalize it, create the role and then work until you faint in the name of your passion. Only then is success achieved or, at least, have the certainty that you gave the best of yourself.