Being Cool in High School

The most important time in your life to be considered ‘cool’ is High School.

There is no other time in your life when you are more sensitive to what people say, what they think, what they believe, how they dress, and speak.

The Opinion of ‘Everybody’ has more power over you, (and might continue to have power, turning you into a Sheep) then it did the years Mommy dressed you.

If you are not cool in High School you grow up with a kind of inferiority complex, which may never be overcome.

If you are considered cool, you breeze into life..

Those who graduated back in the Pliestocine might have a bit of recalling what was cool when you rode the Brontasaurus to school, and the Beatles were brand new, but after a short reverie you’ll remember.

Those who are in High School now should pay particular attention so as to insure that they don’t waste four years (or so) of their lives.

Let’s reflect

I’m unpacking some old High School Year Books for a Visual Aid. I want you imagine the photos I’m going to present. The usual shoulders neck head. Staged expression on the face.

Can you discern who was the Class Queen and who was considered unworthy to live?

This is a trick question.

In most cases. Looking at the photos, even separating them into beauty and the beast, you are likely to be so wrong you’ll fall off your chair.

Coolness is not captured in a posed school photo where everyone has their hair styled, is dressed in something special, and may be wearing makeup.

Janelle, who was the unquestioned Goddess at my High School is not the prettiest girl. Fresh eyes do not put her in the top ten. Not even in the top twenty.

The prettiest girl sat with me in nerd corner.

What?

Take a good look. There’s no make-up on her face, her hair is not fussed with, and until you really focus, you might not even realise that she was quite beautiful.

Why was she overlooked?

Projection.

She didn’t know she was beautiful, she didn’t think about ‘pretty’, she went to school to learn and learned, and sat with the rest of the Nerds, never thinking there was anything special about her.

Janelle, on the other hand, was spoiled to the point she believed she caused the sun to rise in the morning, and that the world should appreciate her presence. Everyone in her ambit believed she was ‘all that’ and so she was ‘all that.’

Let’s look at the boys.

OK, let’s get it down to a few hunky looking guys.

Which one was king?

Nope. Not him.

He was the class clown, and this is the first time he was seen without a goofy smile.

No.

Not that one either.

He wore glasses, and no one looked at him twice.

Nope.

This one was so dumb that drool ran down his chin.

That one, way down at the bottom level of “hunk” was actually the Number One.

What?