The last day of my junior year I was asked by my english teacher what I planned to do after I graduated high school. When I answered I planned to get my doctorate in psychology and one day help children who were molested and needed someone to talk to class erupted in laughter. I didn’t really get what was so funny until one boy said “the bougie DeWayne Clifton actually wants to help somebody, that will be one cold day in hell.” I had to stop myself from getting angry because I realised that from the way everybody percieved me that my career choice probably did sound quite humorous. All the rest of the day I kept thinking about the way everyone assumed they knew me simply because of the way they assumed my life was. I then decided that one day if it was ever possible I would try to find a way to get people to look beyond the superficial layer of people and see what is really in their heart. I think back to that day and I still feel a little bit of sadness by the way that my classmates assumed things about me.

With my project I want to find a way to get people to look beyond the outside layer of people. If people started to really get to know somebody then they would not be so quick to label somebody and move on. There have been many of times when I have just labeled somebody as something and never given it a second thought. Later when I got to know this person I would be suprised at the experiences and issues that person has had to deal with and how it has affected them. Most times there was a very good reason for the person to behave like the did or put out the image that they put out there for others to see. I remember one boy that I didn’t get along with in the beginning because he wasn’t really on my “status level”. I have never been a guys guy. I hung out with mostly girls and the guys that I did hang out with were just like me so I always rejected every other type of male friendship. This guy was a big jock and was known for always putting out a tough image so I never really tried to get to know him. We would always end up getting into fights because of our very different views on different subjects and the way we thought things should be done.

One day my teacher got sick of our constant fighting and made us partners in a getting to know each other excersice. We had to spend a week straight getting to know your partner. At the end of the project we had to present what we learned about our partner and the class could as us questions about each other. At the beginning of the project we continued with our fighting until one day we both decided to just put our differences aside and try to see what we could learn about each other. We started out by telling each other our life story. He went first and when he finished I felt so bad about every fight we had. The things that he had gone through and was contiuing to go through made me understand why he acted the way he had. I then saw how I had sometimes intentionally picked fights with him just because he was different from me. I vowed then and there to never do that to anyone else. I then told him my own lifestory and he was also suprised by the stuff I had gone through in my life. We then apologised to each other and we have been friends ever since.

I think that by presenting something like this project we had to do for my psychology class in high school might be a good way to get people to stop judging people based upon their outward appearances and actions. Of course it would not be a whole week long project like we had to do. Maybe something like getting two people who know nothing about each other together. Then have them look at each other and tell me what they think of that person based solely on what they see. Then have them have maybe a five to ten minute conversation with that person and see how wrong or write they were in their assumptions of the other person. I think this would make people really stop and look at the way the viewed people and made opinions on others.

In the long run I would hope that people would maybe not be so quick to brush off someone simply by the way that they looked or acted. I know that every person I met after I had to do my project in high school I have started to look deeper then my intial opinion of them. I have made many friends since then. Most of my closest friends are people who in the beginning I never would have even thought about hanging out with but after I got to know them I realised we had many things in common and the things that we didn’t have in common only added to our relationship.

I realise that I am very late in my updating of my blog. I do not know why I am so against actually coming on here and writing. My friends and I keep our journals online but its a lot easier to write in that one because I can write about anything I am thinking. But I see that as I start writing the words kind of keep flowing. Right up until I hit word 893 then I have nothing else to say. I never realised that I could could into so much detail. I really don’t like doing it. The only reason this last paragraph is here is so I can meet the 1000 word mark. And by golly I think I’ve done it.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 28th, 2005 at 9:44 pm and is filed under Project Progress, Week 03: Your Project. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.