Reflection

The events that change our lives are never the large things as a whole, though it is these events that often get credit for changing us. To put it simply, each big journey, voyage, or risk that we take is a story, and the moments that it took us to get there are the chapters. Costa Rica as a whole, as my story, was not what changed my life, and not what altered the core of myself. It was the moments, the seconds, the small events that make that story unfold that started to reshape my existence.
I was dropped off at the airport without knowing or understanding what the following weeks would do for my life. Dressed in my mint green shirt and sweatpants, I wheeled my luggage inside and saw the group of students I’d be traveling with. The twelve of us had met each other only a few weeks ago- all of us different. There we were, toting the books of our lives under our arms, eager to fill a new chapter in them. These books contain stories that have shaped us; into who we have been, who we are, and inevitably who we will be. By only looking at the covers of our books- we shouldn’t have gotten along. We should have dispersed as soon as the plane landed and spent the next two weeks in solitude, but instead we started to read each other, and we started to look in order to see. Without realizing it at that time, I was about to embark on a trip with some of my very best friends.
Through the flight and the first night there, I awkwardly but confidently showed everyone who I really was. Though I am typically insecure and shy to show people I’ve just met my actual self, I threw away the veil that covers who I am and let the people around me get to know me as me. I was received warmly, and though everyone on the trip was different, with their own baggage and stories, I received them all warmly as well. We were a unit, an indivisible group of students who had an addiction to learning and experiencing the things around us. We all came to Costa Rica in the middle of our current chapters, and yet regardless where we stuck our bookmarks, we let this experience unify us. That part alone, pushing each other to see past our covers, to dive into each others books, to read and understand why we are the way we are, it was an experience that defines me as who I am going to be in my life. And though I’ve heard this before, what really changed me was realizing that certain things we are taught as we mature and grow are true and necessary to really get as much joy out of life as possible.
We hear it everywhere, and we are taught this credo as kids: Don’t judge a book by its cover. But how often, in our protected and innocent lives as children- are we faced with such big concepts?
Though not always, and certainly through no malicious intent, we grow into our comfort zone. Our experiences through life soften our hearts, and harden our eyes. Eventually, if you so choose, you can look at someone, with eyes that do not see them.
Though I try to be open minded, I too am guilty of judging someone before I even know anything about them. When we do this, we cheat them, and we cheat ourselves. We create a world in which a person may not be welcome based on their ideas, their vocabulary, their accent, their race. We address one part of them, and shove that person away in a box with that label, and never give them or ourselves a chance to really get to know that person.
One of the interesting things about Costa Rica is that it allows us all to get a different perspective on how we are looked at on the outside in. In Arizona we see many people who unfairly judge people with brown skin, regardless of whether or not they know their immigration status. Many people write off these individuals, as if their residency actually means something in the long run. They are hostile and cold to people who are probably just trying to do the best they can, for their family, for their friends, for themselves. This attitude allows us to make them “the other”. To box them away and become angry for things that we, and they, have no control over. In Arizona, those people live their lives on the outside. Though many people are welcoming, and overlook the status of their citizenship, it is never enough, and the cold truth is that too many live their lives rioting against the facets of humanity.
In Costa Rica, we were “the other“. And though several (most) were very welcoming, and almost everyone genuine and sincere, it didn’t take long before I became very defensive and embarrassed about where I came from. When we visited Country Day School, a philosophy teacher named Mr. Brunson verbally attacked me, my classmate, and my coordinator for being from Arizona. He looked at us, after we had told him where we were visiting from, and resentment flittered across his face. And it was quick, but it was there. He then asked us if “we were all really that racist”. and then proceeded to ask us, in front of his students, what we were even doing in their school. I have always been proud to be an American, but in that moment, I was ashamed. I was ashamed to have the decisions of people I do not agree with stamped across me. I felt like I had the words “Ignorant racist” scrawled across my forehead.
I was not ill received everywhere, and for that I am grateful. But how strange that one would need to feel grateful for not being judged. The problem with judging someone by their cover is that how often do we select their covers for them? Mr. Brunson assumed my cover said Arizonan Racist, Here For No Good Reason. What an interesting place to find yourself in, where suddenly the decisions of others can make you as an individual feel embarrassed.
I feel like for the most part, I am very aware of other people, and understand that no one thing makes them who they are, but it was really an amazing experience, to be put in a situation where suddenly I was left feeling insecure about where I come from. It gave me new depth to understanding what immigrants (especially those south of the border) must go through on a day to day basis.
In reality, this aspect stretches out to every person, and instead of letting it cover us like a blanket in soft and comforting understanding, it envelops most people in a cloud of judgment and write offs. I feel like especially since I am going to be teaching high school, which is where people live their lives judging other people, perhaps I can reach out to the students I have and show them that you can gain so much more if you just actually get to know someone. In high school we are grouped together by the cliques that we are a part of; when in reality most teenagers all share the same insecurities and tenderness. What if I can really help kids, when they’re still kids, learn that when we judge someone, or ourselves, by only what we see, we are doing an injustice to everyone.
I also feel like for the first time in my life, I have stopped judging myself. Many of my stories are dark, and unflattering, or legitimately sad. From abusive ex boyfriends to surviving a lifestyle of risky decisions, most of my stories are tainted with a film of self hatred or uncertainty. I went through a time in my life where I hated myself so much that I allowed myself to do things that I am not proud of. And it became a cycle after I realized what I was doing because I didn’t want to look at myself in the mirror and see myself for who I had allowed myself to become. I woke up about three years ago. And I left everything, my friends, my home, my life, to work on myself and figure things out. And I’ve turned my life around since then, but I have never forgotten, and certainly never forgiven myself for what I did to myself. I have slowly become more confident through the years, but I was still so wound up in how other people thought of me, and I had convinced myself that if someone treated me poorly it was because I deserved to be treated that way. I looked at myself and still saw a failure, regardless achieving straight A’s and keeping my life on track. Even as we boarded the plane to Costa Rica. I was unsure of myself.
It is shocking to me how fourteen days can shake out the cobwebs and ghosts of old insecurities. How finding a way to communicate with someone who does not share your language can be so joyous that it makes you realize how insignificant so many of our plights are. To me, though I feel every single story of every single day started to reshape how I thought of myself, I really think I have to say that the day we went repelling was the day that showed me what a unique and cool person I am. I don’t think repelling alone could have done this for me, but I think this mixed in with everything else that we did, everything else that I learned, pushed me into seeing myself in a different light.
For one, I am a person who was generally very vain. I think because I saw such a mess on the inside, I really relied on my looks to make myself feel good about myself, and that almost always left me scrutinizing and critiquing every part of myself. Repelling, and mostly the humidity in Costa Rica as a whole, taught me to throw vanity on a back burner. That caring what you look like is incredibly silly when you are out not just existing in, but living your life. Who cares if you’re covered in sweat and canyon water and you’ve got make up running down your face if you’re smiling and experiencing something that is one of a kind and incredible.
It also taught me that I am someone who wants to experience what life has to offer, that I am open to new things that can help build and define the type of person that I am. After everything that I experienced while we were studying abroad, I stopped looking and myself and seeing the past. I started looking at myself and seeing who I am, and seeing the future. I stopped caring about what other people thought of me, because I know how I think about myself. I accept myself as who I am, and that would not have been possible without the things we did in Costa Rica showing me who it is that I am.
I hope to carry this with me always. I hope that I can hold on to my experiences and allow them to guide me through my life. I hope that I continue to think this highly of myself, and continue to learn things about someone before I decide if they fit in my life or not. I hope to teach children that life is what we make it. That we create the beauty in the world. That by accepting people, we flourish and grow ourselves. That we make some of our best friends out of people we never thought we’d get to know. I hope to teach people to open their eyes, to open their hearts. To look at someone, with eyes that see them.
The finalized product of my Costa Rica story did more than educate me academically. It made me learn things about myself, about the people around me, about life. It made me feel that finally, I can see.