Growing up as a Millennial is a tricky thing in this world. As you can see there are articles about us streaming the internet far and wide. Now, I am not writing this to vent any specific idea. I am only writing my own experience with being a so called "Millennial Child."
Growing up I was told I was special, and it was very easy for me to believe. Easy in the sense that I grew up in rural Utah and there weren't a whole lot of people to compete with for being "Special." I was the youngest of Seven Children and there was also a seven year gap in between my next sibling and myself. I essentially grew up an only child, I did not have brothers and sisters close in age to fight with. If I did fight with my siblings then I regretted it because not only did they have age but height on me as well, this taught me to pretty much keep to myself when playing games. Also I grew up in the town of Morgan, so when I was little the next child my age lived over two miles away at least. There were no backyard friends for me. I kept company with the many kittens that our cats gave birth to and a large mound of topsoil that had piled up in the front field. I was the queen of my own world. My parents must have thought that I was the Queen of the cats as well, and I am sure they feared for my social future. I had imaginary friends, they were named "Chandelier," and "Tennis Court." My kittens also were made to suffer my creative naming skills. My favorite names are: Green Grass (he was a gray kitten), Creamy (orange and white stripes, not totally surprising as creamsicles were my favorite food), and my personal favorite Pause, (not Paws) but Pause...She was named after the VCR. My family had another knack for naming the adult cats, there was a Hitler and Mussolini and currently there is one cat by the name of Lucifer. (NO we don't abuse our animals).
Enough about the stupid cats. I also was a little violinist growing up, however Morgan Utah did not have any sort of orchestral program at the time. Therefore I was the ONLY Violinist of my age in Morgan for quite a while. Not till high school did I discover that two more people had moved to the county who could also play the violin. I was different and I was special. Even at church events I was told that I was part of a marked generation, that we would be the greatest generation yet. Yes, it was really easy to believe that I was Special.
Luckily I had a family who taught me that nothing comes for free, and that all things are earned. I wasn't entitled to anything just because I simply existed. Was I given a whole lot of opportunity? YES! am I grateful for this? YES! One very crucial thing I also learned was that my future was not going to come to me, but I had to go after it. Today, many people graduate from University and they automatically expect a Job will drop from the sky. I hear many people my age complaining that the Job force is too saturated and that it is almost impossible to get a job. Well, I am under the impression that unless you put yourself out into uncomfortable situations and you really dig deep you won't find that magical job you are looking for. As you can tell I believed myself to have a very stable head on my shoulders. I knew that if I did anything with my mind made up, and determination then I could accomplish anything in the world.
However, I didn't know that there was problem lurking in my future, (my Achilles heel so to say) would lie in the fact that I am utterly HUMAN, and humans are not perfect. I thought I could cheat my human state to achieve supreme greatness, simply by doing my very best. Well it came as a shock to me when this last semester I failed two college courses (Both General Education courses) I had finished every requirement of my Major and I was on course to Graduate when all of a sudden these two courses turned me over backwards and dumped me in the mud. I have failed courses before, but whenever I did I knew it was because I hadn't studied or tried to learn the material. But this time, it was to be my last semester of Univeristy EVER....and I failed 2 freshman level courses. I studied so thoroughly and intently for both courses, I can honestly say that there was nothing I could have done to try harder than I did....and I failed.
Imagine my humiliation, and my confidence was completely shot. Even now I don't want to think about re-taking those courses...so I avoid thinking about it. Everything that I had ever believed of myself went straight out the window. I am ashamed that my confidence was so easily discarded when my abilities were questioned in the slightest.
Then one day I came to the startling realization that I......am normal. I am Human. I am no exception to the rule. Hard things will come and I will still have to deal with them. I WILL FAIL SOMETIMES, and there will be nothing I can do but to get up and try again. This was the one thing that I never learned growing up was how to accept my failures. If I ignore them then they will remain my failures, if I try to overcome them, they may still be my failures...but at least I will be climbing towards resolution. Failing is one way to take a step back and look at the problem objectively and start anew with a better idea of accomplishing something great.
“ It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all—in which case, you fail by default."
-JK Rowling.
When suffering from a failure, you are only in the company of those who have failed before, but got up and eventually achieved success. Like Walt Disney, and Albert Einstein. I'm OK being in their company. I am a Millennial kid...but that doesn't mean exactly what the world thinks it means. We are not exempt from failures, but it is through our failures that we can be achieve greatness and become Special. We just need to acknowledge that failing is a part of life sometimes, and it's not always a bad thing.
