Final Essay

Boundless Passion

During my high school science class I noticed that I had a lazy instructor. The teacher just sat in the front of the class and did not do anything. Occasionally, he would assign a couple of problems for the class to do, but he gave no instruction. When I talked to the principal, she told me they were going to fire him, but I was stuck with him until the end of the year. I guess they could not get a substitute for that long of a time. It is frustrating not having a connection with someone that is trying to teach you something. Teachers should have passion while teaching to pass on passion for the subject onto the students. Anthony J D'Angelo said, "Develop a passion for learning. If you do, you will never cease to grow." I think this quote is very beautiful; I like this idea that we will grow from learning. Of course learning could happen anywhere, but it is amplified in the classroom.

What prevents us from living the life we would like to live right now? Some of us might say it is because of lack of money, lack of opportunity, lack of education, or maybe because of family. We all have that desire to achieve something we are passionate about, some roadblocks are bigger than others. When we met Chris McCandless in the biographical novel “Into the Wild,” he seems to have little roadblocks preventing him from a bright future. Jon Krakauer describes McCandless as a somewhat wealthy young man, with a good college education, a seemingly good family, and several opportunities laid out in front of him. McCandless was more than willing to give up his comfortable life to live out his passion.

Passion is a topic that I wanted a deeper understand of, but in order to do that I have to look at the aspects that lead you to your passion. For starters, we look at the importance of connecting with others. Awareness, a result of being connected, is another aspect of being connected to someone. Connection and awareness are important in order to help someone or understand them. After you have that you can help someone during the transition into his or her passion, which can be difficult to do alone. Then we can begin to break down the larger topic of passion, defining it, understanding it, and understanding the connection with privilege. Once we understand these things, we can either help someone achieve their passion or fulfill ours.

I wanted to get a deeper understanding of the importance of connection. Connection is vital in order to learn, grow, or to understand. In relationship, a lack of connecting can make or break the relationship. During class we watched a video about this student at a Texas high school confront a lazy teacher. With some research I found out his name is Jeff Bliss and it is obvious that he just wanted to learn and be connected with the teacher; she did not want to hear it. In both videos you can see how intelligent he is. He is the type of person that would be an excellent teacher, because he understands that teachers need to be passionate about what they are teaching. In another interview with Jeff Bliss, he says that the rant began when he was asking the "teacher" about the time limit on a test. She told him to "quit bitching," he said he snapped. When someone is trying to teach you something and there is no connection it is difficult to see the value in what they are saying. In The Passion Project Ray said, “A great teacher is always like a student because they’re always learning so they’re learning new and better ways to do something.” I wish Bliss’ teacher could have heard that, because if I were a teacher I would be bored just sitting behind a desk while the students filled out packets. Sometimes when I sit in class during an amazing lecture, I feel so lucky for the experience. My favorite thing is when an instructor is surprised in which the direction of the discussion went, they are never disappointed because they had just been forced to look at another perspective. When teachers act lazy it makes the students feel, they do not matter. The best teachers I have had encourage their students to speak their mind. Inside the shoes of the teacher, she could have agreed with him, but maybe did not want to lose the power of head of the class by saying he was right. In several of the videos, school officials say that he went about it in the wrong way, but his message got across did it not? Who knows if they would have listened to him if he went through the "right" way? The whole "right way/ wrong way" thing bothers me. What is the right way? Talking to the principal? The fact that the "right way" is so obscure in the school system shows us that something is wrong. There should be clear guidelines telling students where to report teachers.

Another aspect of connection is the guidance and help you get from it. The people who need the most help, usually do not ask for it. If there is no connection, they will not see or care that someone needs help. There is a speech by Jeff Duncan-Andrade's about the growing violence in Oakland and the effects on the children that grow up there. When we were watching this video in class our instructor stopped the video at the beginning and asked us what we thought the video was going to be about. The majority opinion was that it was to be about discrimination, poverty, or the problems with privilege. Although those answers may be a factor it was not the direction he went. He starts talking about how Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is what the kids are facing. Duncan-Andrade says that because of the constant trauma that the "post" is unnecessary, since it is current. There are people in my life who have PTSD, I know how hard it can be to live with it, and to imagine these children or teens living with it is just horrible. What Duncan-Andrade is saying is very similar to what Ray in The Passion Project, when ray said; “Students have to feel like they’re home so if they wanna be comfortable they gotta get comfortable with the teacher. We kinda have to know about the teacher and we gotta feel like the teacher is real, like he really or she really truly wants to help us.” My favorite thing about his speech is that he wants to help Oakland from within its schools. That he and other teachers can provide a sort of "safe haven" for the kids is a genius idea. It reminds me of what I was saying in an earlier post, that teachers need to be more caring for their students. It is not surprising that this video and the Passion Project both believe that when teachers are more understanding to their students in the classroom. The result is that children feel safer and that school will be a more enjoyable experience. School can be an escape from the dangers in their neighborhood.

To sprout off of what I was saying earlier, a factor of connection is awareness. Awareness something I did not want to rush through. Being aware of the world and people around us can help us be more compassionate. There is an amazing commencement speech by David Foster Wallace called "This is Water." It starts talking about the how mundane life is, which reminds me of what Chris McCandless, who seemed to be worried about falling into that type of lifestyle. The difference being, Wallace is telling the graduating students that you can take the mundane life and be aware of what reality really is. Take the mundane moments and make them yours, that it is your freedom. I am not saying that McCandless is wrong, I think he took his freedom to fulfill his passion. Wallace goes on to say something that fits with McCandless story, "The capital "t"- Truth is about life before death." When Jon Krakauer wrote Into the Wild, he wrote mainly about McCandless' life. Hardly focusing on how he died, because they wanted to focus on what made up his life. Being aware of how someone got to where they are is important in understanding who they are, which was probably Krakauer’s goal.

Awareness is an important quality to possess, because it strengthens how we learn. If someone is able to adapt using awareness they can cross boundaries others cannot. We learn from each other, so awareness is beneficial to everyone. David Foster Wallace explains this best in his speech when he says, "It is about the real value of a real education, which has (almost) nothing to do with knowledge, and everything to do with simple awareness." This quote in particular, is where I feel McCandless and Wallace were on the same page. McCandless knew there is a difference between knowledge and awareness. We see this when he was working in the fast food restaurant, he worked at an average pace, and he seemed to enjoy his mundane moments. Earlier when I was saying McCandless seemed to be worried about falling into the traditional mundane lifestyles, I think is wrong. Sure, when I first heard about McCandless' death that is what I thought. I think it was part of it, but that is why Krakauer and Sean Penn were so fascinated in learning about McCandless' life. McCandless has more under the surface and was very aware of everything, despite what the critics want to believe.

When I was defining awareness, I tried to be aware of everything I was reading. Understanding the person that is talking is very helpful to understand why they took the actions they took. Sometimes I could look at two people who seemed to have different viewpoints, but looking at their actions you can see they are very much on the same page. A good example was looking at the similarities between Chris McCandless and David Foster Wallace. Their similarities are small, but it is in their uniqueness that helps them get their message out there. Wallace points out that he is not giving the traditional commencement speech, they both shy away from the usual ways of doing things. Which is the reason why I admire McCandless and am so inspired by Wallace's speech. To go even further, it reminds me of Sara from The Bread Givers. When we were writing on the board about what a hero is, I think McCandless fits into that category. Often critics say that he was selfish, unprepared, or suicidal. I do not think he was any of those things. McCandless, like Sara, had his reason for not contacting his family. He had been preparing for his Alaska trip for a few years, it is not like he randomly woke up one morning, and felt he was ready for the harshness of Alaska. McCandless knew he could die doing what he was doing; yet he still wanted to go through with it. We should not hold anything against him because some dreams are risky. That does not mean we should avoid our dreams. He was living his dream, and that is more than many people can say.

There is a transition from your normal life and becoming success. I think defining success can help us understand the difficulty in the transition. Success to me would be surrounding myself with good people, staying happy, and healthy. I think defining success would be different for different people. Take Chris McCandless, he wanted a journey. McCandless and I would probably agree that being successful would not be having a lot of money. Success and failure oddly can go hand in hand, Andrew in The Passion Project explains this well, “I think you have to succeed and fail to appreciate what you have. You know you see all your failures and then you take into account those failures and then you think okay well now you have a successful you know you succeed for once. You know, you appreciate that.” If you look at everything McCandless was able to do, travel and meet interesting people, he seemed to have lived a very rich life. Before he started his adventure, he lived a life that most would define as very successful. He had money, never was hungry, had a good education, was living on his own, and had a car. A strong element was missing from his life, the truth. Everything he had, he seemed to feel was a lie because of his parent's deceit. I believe that he wanted to create his own path so he did not follow his parent’s footsteps. The important thing to look at when it comes to defining success is that it will not be perfect. You may face some failure, but it does not mean that you are a failure. If you look at your heroes they have had trouble along the way. The thing to look at is that they tried.

Many people are just in a transition in their life. As you grow up your idea of a being a success changes. I think what determines how a person perceives success is from their peers. In a letter Chris McCandless wrote to Ron Franz, "So many people live within unhappy circumstances they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man that a secure future (Krakauer, 58)." Knowing that being a success does not have to mean making a lot of money. Defining being a success will be different for everybody. What makes McCandless' adventure so honorable is that he was doing it for himself. He did not care about others idea of what being a success is. McCandless did not worry about being successful in areas most people would try and achieve like in a career or education. Success for McCandless was something completely different, which is why his story is uniquely interesting.

I think a lot of the texts we were going over in class are about handling a transition. The difficulty in handling a transition is that people usually have to go about it alone. That is why connecting, being aware, is so helpful for the transition. So they are not alone. A great example, would be my favorite book by Laura Lam called Pantomime. When we were reading all the novels for this class I was instantly reminded of it. I do not want to give away too many spoilers, but it deals with issues with controlling parents, sexuality, belonging, and overall growing up. Another excellent example of a transition is the Chabot College film made by its students called Focus the Lasers, which is about the types of students at a community College. The great thing about the film is that it showed that it is alright where you are and where you are going. What I mean is that it is okay whatever profile you are in, because things can change. I think for me the transition is frightening, I am worried that I will mess up. To go back to when Samira said in the Passion video, "[...] I felt like I was fed to the wolves. I had no idea what was going on in the outside world." Transiting can be difficult, even if you are transitioning into a better life. If you have never talked to any of the students at Chabot, this video is a good example of what they are like. What I liked about the video was that despite it having little narration, the point of the video still got across. The video profiles each type of community college student. As for me, I think I am a seeker. Although I have felt like other profiles before. Listening to these students, it is easy to see there is a lot stacked up against them. I think I am on the brink of becoming, what they call in the video, a laser.

In class we have had some truly intense discussions about privilege and how it encompasses our lives even if we are unaware of it. I had to really think about the relationship between passion and privilege, because they seem to be so different. Just because someone is comfortable financially does not imply they will be happy. Just because they are financially comfortable does not mean that they are or will be fulfilling their passion. In the Chabot College film The Passion Project, we see that following your dreams is directly related to finding your happiness. Karina gave a good example of that when she said, "They'd rather me be a nurse because they get money or they're in high demand or something and I don't wanna do that." That is something Chris McCandless had to go through. His parents had a clear view of what his life should be. Like I said earlier, as we get older our passion can change.

When I was defining privilege in my last essay, I learned that privilege person probably do not know the severity of their actions. When we look at privilege in relation to passion, we see that a privilege person prevents those who attempt to achieve their passion. Although, the privileged person probably believes that they are protecting them. A big topic in The Passion Project was that teachers who were once probably very passionate about what they are teaching, become bored, and it shows in the classroom. I think everyone can name at least one teacher who seemed bored. What I enjoyed about The Passion Project was that they gave some great ideas for teachers to fall in love with teaching again. Tiffany had an idea of getting closer to the students, "If you want to get in tune with your class then you are going to have to get personal with them." I love this idea; the students change even if the content is the same. Tiffany also added that incorporating projects that "let you know what type of person you are." When teachers do that, it makes them feel like they want you to succeed. When you feel so lost, having someone believe in you restores a lot of faith in yourself.

Another interesting result in looking at the relationship between passion and privilege is that we see things we would normally miss. In this case, I wondered what it would mean if someone in the privileged position trying to achieve their passion. This may be a really out there idea, but I think privilege can hold you back. I know that we are going to start reading the novel Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer soon, and not to spoil it for anyone, but it is about someone who felt that privilege was holding him back. Living a very posh life might seem nice but it removes the element of risk. Ray put it as, "[...] Without taking risks you're stuck in one place. It's when you take these risks when you pursue, it makes you pursue different things to open doors to possibilities." Without stepping out of our comfort zones once in awhile it is harder to grow as an individual. Chris McCandless in Into the Wild, needed to get away from privilege to get to know himself, because being privileged can be distracting. Passion allows risk to happen so you can achieve some dream you have. The Passion Project was an excellent film made by Chabot College students. I have seen this film twice and I am glad I did. There are so many great concepts layered into this movie that watching it twice really helped me see things that I missed. Our class assignment was to pick something in the film that spoke to us, and really you could just pluck out any moment from the film. The entire piece felt as if they were talking to me personally. I instantly thought of how great this would have been able to see during high school, it would have put out the fire of nervousness that was inside of me.

When we start talking about passion, I started wondering about those whose passion is undecided or unclear. There are those who live out their passion more spontaneously. I feel a lot of those people get left out. In the Chabot College film The Passion Project, they started talking in the film about how they undecided, once was undecided, or that it was alright to be. I guess because felt insecure about not knowing what I wanted to do, that I just tried to avoid talking about it. To know that several people feel like that too is just what I needed to hear. Probably my favorite advice was when Samira said, "[...] To know that my mind is undecided. To know that just knowing that I'm undecided that I'm going to change every single day." What she said spoke to me because I had never heard anyone put it that way; it gave me such hope for myself. Knowing that you should never give up on yourself is vital. That is where Chris McCandless and I are probably very similar; despite his goal to go to Alaska he was very in the moment. Up to the point when he left for Alaska, he seemed pretty undecided. He was willing to try new things and go new places, allowing him to grow.

Where can we learn about passion? There does not seem to be a specific place to explore and understand passion. Chabot College is developing a class where incoming students discuss their passion and future. The class also plans to talk about and critique the education system. One of the people that is developing the course, who happens to be my English professor, asked my class if a class that is geared to talk about their futures relates to critiquing the education system. Karina from The Passion Project answers that question, “Really a lot of teacher’s think that the content is enough. Like it’s not enough [...]” I believe that critiquing education and a student's future are completely related. The reason for this is that students know first hand the problems students encounter and they may have some great solutions. In class, another student pointed out that being forced into critiquing education, something that they probably would not care about, is not really fair. I do agree with that, the class could scare people away, but I think if is approached in the right way the class could really get through to people. A few posts ago I did a post about a student from Texas named Jeff Bliss, he stood up to a lazy teacher. I believe that the passion class could allow students to speak up about or talk about lazy teachers. Since most people probably never talk about the issues in education, giving them an outlet seems to be a good idea.

Connecting with people can spark passion. What I mean by that is, connecting with others and being passionate are very similar things. In order to connect with others, you have to be passionate about what you are talking about. In The Passion Project, the students were talking about the importance of interacting with other students. Being able to talk with other students and seeing their point of view can broaden your mind. I would say that discussing education in this class would help get some students more interested in what is happening in the school system. I think there will still be teachers stuck in their ways, but I think the class should be taken by people considering teaching as a career. Or at least, invite teachers to sit in and join the discussion. The next question our teacher asked us was if looking at ourselves would relate to the passion class. I reflected on The Passion Project and found Romeo’s words insightful, “We can learn things about ourself that don’t know or other people by just listening to them.” The idea of doing this is that in order to look toward your future, we need to accept or understand our past. An example given was if you came to College believing that you want to be a nurse, but when you reanalyze their past could understand why they made that decision. Maybe their parents wanted them to be a nurse, could be cultural, and maybe it was just always expected to do that. There are countless possibilities but understanding your past could help someone decide on their future. Considering that Chabot has a pretty high dropout rate, it might be a good idea to have them think about these things. It could prevent them from walking down the wrong path. In the video with Jeff Bliss, we see most of the students sitting around not saying anything. This is not their fault; I think students believe that they cannot speak out. If there is a class that allows students to speak their mind I think that it is the beginning of something great.

Passion can be very different in other cultures, so when we start talking about passion it can be a very difficult topic to define. By looking at why every culture deals with passion differently can unlock so many possibilities to look at. It is interesting that the Latin word for passion means to suffer, which shows mean that everyone can have a very different definition for the same word. In the passion class when they start talking about different cultures to be sensitive to that. We started talking about how some cultures select your career path for you. It shows us that these are very deep questions that may not have a definitive answer. It is pretty complicated, you might be passionate about doing one thing, but your parents or culture are telling you to do something different. The class could make students either make some tough decisions or to do nothing. You cannot have someone change who they are, but I think having their opinion about it would make the discussion even more interesting.