I just realised something. All my life, my achievements, all of the supposedly worthwhile things that made me special? They didn't come easy to me. Well, I'm excluding a huge part of my life like grade school, or the first half of high school, because I'm thoroughly convinced that they were so easy compared to what other students my age at that time were supposed to be accomplishing. Shekinah just made me believe that I was actually doing shit. Well, with piano. I don't understand why I never saw it as a burden. Like come on, I was always practicing for at least a good 4 years of my life. I never saw myself as anything other than a pianist. Come to think of it, I was like one of those kids' toys with holes that were meant to be filled with all kinds of pegs. I had a lot of holes, which were my potentials. The piano peg somehow really fit into the biggest hole, and it was what defined most of my early life. I had no choice. I didn't have a thing yet. I wasn't made to choose. I was just somehow forced, well not really, but I was made to take up piano lessons because I had nothing else better to do. I mean, when I think about it, why wasn't my thing reading books? I could have read a thousand by now and could have been more qualified to start writing that book I've been itching to write but have no idea what it's going to be about. And now, look at me. All the things that are worthwhile to me don't come easy anymore. They've never been easy, but I was tricked into thinking that I moved mountains when I really was just above average. The sad part is that, I could have been something special. If they had used my potential to its fullest. And by they, I mean the adults who were responsible for my education. What scares me is this supposed 'discipline' I've been cultivating all these years wasn't actually discipline at all, but was a rather normal work load for someone my age when I was younger. Now, I'm tired. Because now, I'm actually required to do legitimately difficult tasks. Where procrastination actually has some really damaging and tangible effects on my grade. Or maybe moderately difficult tasks, which I would expectedly not do well in considering my disposition to treating accomplishing the normal workloads as huge achievements that merit recognition. I can't even blame myself, because I was regularly being awarded for it for so many years of my life. And now, I realised, I never had any kind of respectable discipline. I might have had some, but procrastination almost always took over. AND NOW, instead of feeling disciplined and organised like what a normal disciplined person would feel and do, I am burnt out days before the finals. I guess my early childhood and teenage medals and accomplishments don't mean a thing. Looking back, I can actually confidently say that I was awarded valedictorian medals for being a kind of mediocre smart. The kind of intelligence that I have doesn't permit me to actually get consistent results. I've always had gaps. These gaps just keep getting wider and wider. And that's why I'm so behind the lessons in college. I could get a high grade here and there, but they were always unreliable, as I also get average to below average scores in a lot of things. In high school, I was awarded for getting high grades in a system that I had somehow hijacked. Or maybe the system was just not that good at accurately assessing young people's intelligence. I slipped through the cracks. But somehow I'm here. At the most prestigious university in the Philippines. Why should I be sad when I see other people have higher grades than me? Of course I know the answer to that. I was always used to being first, and not being first makes me furious. It's a very insidious kind of conditioning that was applied to me my entire life. An identity crisis envelopes the entire scope of how I feel right now. I feel worthless because I no longer possess the thing. You know, my thing. Being the smartest kid in class thing. No wonder, I remember joining big academic contests, and surprise, surprise, I almost always DID NOT win at all. Because lots of other people were and are smarter than me. All the small contests inside school and somehow those not so big contests, I could manage and probably win 3rd place. But really, when you compare me to a lot of smart people, especially UP students, I might just be, without a doubt, at the bottom of the food chain. The bottom rung. The black sheep. The "kinda" smart person. Don't know why I was blind to all of that and didn't do anything. I probably suppressed my denial in some way. Maybe some part of my small little teenage head said that I could pretend to be smart and wing it in college. But so far, college has been very good at putting me in my place. The one I deserve. And I know it's intense training. It hurts. It makes my anxiety worse. It makes my self-esteem plummet to depths I never knew went that deep. I'm catching up, I know it. I'm always falling behind. But I will make it. However, as sad as the last couple of paragraphs were, I'm obliged to give my best. Because God gave me this. Whatever it is. Whatever his plan for me is. Whether it's cum laude, magna cum laude, or even summa cum laude. I'm not just after the honours, but I'm actually after everything that I've been wanting all these years. And they could all be achievable if I develop this one thing. Discipline. True and genuine discipline. And all areas of my life will improve. I just hope I end up with the right motives. Because this part of my life is just a mess. I always end up chasing after something and giving up because it's too hard, and my lack of discipline and solid habits have made it so hard not to have any excuse when my problems become more difficult than normal. What's normal to me anyway? I'm always complaining whether my problems are big or small. i don't discriminate. I whine about everything, whether audibly or not. I whine here. I whine everywhere. I make sure to blame everyone else for my problems before realising that I can fix this if I just had enough discipline. But when I do realise that my problems do have solutions that are doable, I procrastinate. If my life was a book, this is where the protagonist must overcome some kind of impossibly difficult problem and where he emerges triumphant. Just before the climax. This is the part of my life where everything looks dim and sad and hopeless. Who knows? Maybe I'd have more slumps like these in the future. But my first year in college will always be that slump. The biggest and most painful because this is the one where I'm the most unprepared. And don't forget inexperienced and possibly the most stupid I'll ever be in my teenage life. I'm supposed to come out stronger. But I feel really really weak. I just want to go home and do nothing and just read books and maybe eat macaroni and pizza and drink almond milkshakes for a few days. But of course I can't. Because sometimes, in my case: usually, life doesn't turn out the way I want it. I think I won't even get accepted into Computer Science and all of my programming dreams become null. The book that I would have written would end up being badly received. But I'm just going to have to try harder if any of that happens.