"we're the new face of failure"

aka from "most likely to succeed" to success

growing up, i was the quintessential golden child of academic excellence and citizenship. i completed more community service every year than most of my friends had over their entire careers. i graduated from high school with a 5-page resume filled with academic honors, leadership experience, internships, blah, blah, blah.

top (l-r): captain of cheer squad, biomedical intern at naval medical research center, student member on the county board of education
bottom (l-r): penn state summer science intern, panel speaker in county town hall, pre-college carnegie mellon student

i was like some freaky all-american and almost always did the "right" thing, from heading my student body as president in high school to sitting on the exec board of the residence hall federation in college. now that i think about it, it's almost kind of sickening. i had my entire future planned out, and i expected a lot from myself starting at a very young age. others did, too.
when i was voted "most likely to succeed" in high school, it came as no surprise. to anyone. i was told time and time again that i would run the world. i planned to become a supreme court justice, and entered college knowing i would take over and do amazing things.
everything was going as planned - i enrolled into a doctoral program straight from undergrad with the expectation that i would conduct research on justice and policy. after becoming a mcnair scholar and discovering my love of research, i no longer wanted to be an attorney but a sought-after doctor that would have an amazing amount of influence on capitol hill.
and then, i dropped out.
the decision to drop out has been one of those that i have rolled over again and again in my head. and it wasn't until recently that i realized it was the major turning point in my life - when i went off course for the first time. as someone who played by the rules, went by the book, and literally always had a way made for myself, it was extremely hard to face unclear direction, unemployment, and change.
the only "real" job i could get after leaving my program was as an english teacher in dc, and i was not happy about it. nearly every woman in my family has been a teacher at one point, but i honestly had no respect for the profession. i had never wanted to be a teacher, and becoming one was more than ironic - it was tragic. in short, it was the first of many times that i felt like a failure.
like i wasn't special anymore. that everyone had been wrong about me. that i had been wrong about myself.
last week, my cheerleaders performed for the first time for the whole school. as the founder of the first-ever cheer squad at my school, pride couldn't possibly encompass what i felt.

i had helped put something together that not only helped boost the self-esteem of my girls (and my boy!), but ingrained a sense of pride and community at my school for both teachers and students. and it made me realize that changing the world doesn't require a fancy title or position. it can be done by regular people doing regular things that create a series of change little by little.
i may not be what i thought i was going to be, but i am more than i could've ever imagined. and if this is how failure looks...

... stay tuned for #epicfail. ♥
Britt