Self Respect

I think I jumped a little when my greeting echoed back through the microphone. I am not used to speaking into a microphone. I am not used to standing behind a mammoth desk, using PowerPoint, or teaching in an auditorium-style classroom. At the start of the lecture there were about 50-60 students. A dozen freshmen students, who had just finished a listening exam, slipped in before the end.

I was happy to see a lot of my students there, even my ridiculously-busy sophomore students. I was pretty excited about the topic: self respect. It is amazing how these topics are related to topics we have covered in class lately: maturity, decisions, priorities, generation gap, gender roles…we didn’t even plan it that way!

My voice sounded a little strange to my ears, and it was harder to connect to the students when I was blocked off by a huge desk and unable to move through the aisles, but I quickly got comfortable and assumed my normal mix of seriousness and melodrama. I couldn’t wait to get to this one part where I told the students: You are valuable. I wished so much that if I said it enough times they would believe me. I looked out into their eyes and was a little amazed by the vulnerability I saw.

I was excited to tell them this because in last week’s lesson, over half of the girls said they would rather be men. At the last open house, some of my students told me that their parents or grandparents were disappointed that they were girls. Last semester, one of my students told me that I gave her the first hug she ever received. Last year, a student told me how her relatives had wanted to let her die so the family could have a boy. I wish I was making these things up.

A surprising number of students have talked about interpersonal struggles. How do I make friends? How do I get along with my roommates? My friend won’t talk to me, and I don’t know why. How can I feel connected with others? I am so shy...what can I do?

I understand insecurity. Who doesn’t, really? Today I was glad that I know what it feels like to constantly condemn yourself, to feel that you can never live up to your own impossibly high standards, to fear that even your friends will grow tired of you, to cringe when walking into a room, to feel unworthy to breathe air, to strive every day to be good enough to feel valuable. I’m grateful for that struggle because when I looked out into the eyes of these beautiful girls today, I could see that they know what it feels like too. These are the things that break my heart.

At the end of the hour, the students wrote down questions and headed off for dinner. “Thank you for the lecture,” they said. “What you said was good.” “We are looking forward to next week.” I am too. I think I was made for this.