It's never too early in high school to start taking control of your future. The first thing you have to do though is realize that what you are doing during high school is going to affect that future.
My son wasn't very excited about high school and chose to do just enough to make a passing grade. To develop that type of work ethic in high school can let some air out of the balloon of opportunity available to you when you go into the work force or more critically when you try to enter college. Don't think that later you can easily change your ways either, how you go about getting things done in high school can carry through a long way in life.
I went to university but I have a friend who didn't. Some years later we took a cooking class together and it was taught in a classroom. My friend still had the high school mentality that you had to keep your eyes forward and don't get caught talking or the teacher will get you. In university a student has a more mature approach to education and is treated like an adult. Talking is allowed as long as it isn't disruptive. Also, the professor is there to pass on his knowledge, not to control your behave. He expects his students to have the self discipline to pay attention and get the most possible from the information that is being offered.
Imagine grasping that responsibility when you are freshman in high school. You may not have chosen a future occupation yet but, if you decide to get the most that you can from every class, you're creating an attitude that can give you an advantage in all your future learning activities. When you take on being responsible for yourself when you are young, it becomes your way of doing things, the way of getting the most out of what you're doing. You don't even have to think about it because it's your way of doing life.
We told this to our son and he nodded and agreed but continued to just get by. Two years after graduating something lit a fire under him. He's graduated from university now and is working to become a teacher. While he's at it he's working as a waiter in a high end restaurant where they employ high school students part-time and through the summer. Still in his twenties, my son can relate to high school aged kids and they like to talk to him. He often hears them complaining about how their parents get on their backs about working harder at school and being on time and texting too much; the thing that he tells them is, "Your parents are right. I wish that I had taken better advantage of my time in high school. University would have been more fun and I would have done better if I'd taken high school more seriously."
I felt proud when he told me that he was saying these things to high school kids. We weren't on his case to the extreme but we had a few suggestions regarding how he could do a better job. Back then he didn't take them.
You, as a high school student, can start to improve you chances of having a good future if you begin to do more things right, starting now. If you don't want to do a major overhaul of your school lifestyle then start by doing one thing better. Maybe make sure you're on time to class. Maybe start taking more notes. Maybe choose to ask or answer more questions in class. One little thing that can help you get more from your classes will lead to another and though you may not see it now, and you may not reflect back on it when you're older, all those little improvements and changes of habit that help make you do things right, add up to a bunch of really big things in life.
Ability, confidence, self respect and the respect of others to name a few. These things are calling you now. Take the call.e start taking more notes. Maybe choose to ask or answer more questions in class. One little thing that can help you get more from your classes will lead to another and though you may not see it now, and you may not reflect back on it when you're older, all those little improvements and changes.
Mitch Davies is a writer who will be publishing his second novel in early 2011. His third novel is in the works. Mitch has a keen interest in all things Japanese and has traveled extensively through Japan. His blog, Zonajin, follows his recent three month living experience and visit. Find out more about Mitch's latest book, A Wind In Montanahis, which is a coming of age young adult fiction novel.
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