I've spent most of my life ashamed of being smart. Yep, it's true. And now at 38, I'm finally willing to admit it. How fucked up is that?
I can trace the shame back to 7th grade science… when we had to dissect that dead frog in Mr. Simmons class. I can still hear my lab partner teasing me, "teacher's pet, teacher's pet", for my enthusiasm and curiosity about knowing the inferior vena cava from the superior vena cava, and being praised by the teacher for it. Despite the adult approval, I was thirteen in a new school and just trying to fit in. I took those adolescent social cues to heart and stopped raising my hand first or blurting out the right answer with unconfined excitement. In 7th grade, you don't get liked for being smart, you get teased.
It got a little better in high school. At least in the AP classes I was with other smart kids. But in the regular classes, the social outcasting persisted. I loved math, physics, biology, and chemistry. I studied because it was interesting, and got good grades because it was challenging. The academics were easy. It was the social stuff that was so much more difficult. When I didn't get all A's in my classes, it was because I was too preoccupied with the class' social dynamics, essentially sabotaging my academic achievements just to fit in. I played softball and basketball to round out my heady tendencies and was always embarrassed when I got the scholastic award. I still have them all in a box somewhere, proud that I got any awards in sports I suppose.
I tabled all this behavior as just "normal growing up" but I've been doing some soul searching about it recently. Perhaps because of my 20th high school reunion later this year, or perhaps because of the women in leadership program I've been attending. Or, most likely, a little of both with a splash of therapy to help me connect the dots. I was programmed to think being liked is more important than being smart. And I'm not the only one. Studies show that lots of girls face this same social programming - that above all, it's most important to be liked. I don't want to be a victim of those adolescent insecurities anymore. I'm working on reprogramming myself.
I AM smart. I DO know the answer. And I am PROUD to be a teacher's pet.
