Lessons from a 5th grader

Tim Koehler was the coolest guy I knew. His hair reached his shoulders, he played drums in a rock band, he skateboarded, and he was the only guy to have a girlfriend in the entire 5th grade. Even though Tim Koehler shared a last name with a TOILET company, it somehow had no sway on his social standing.

Growing up, I took piano lessons from my mom. That lasted almost three years, but it wasn’t for lack of effort on my mom’s part—she was incredibly patient. Three years is actually pretty impressive given my track record of 1 season of soccer, a free 1-month trial of karate, a whopping 2 years of baseball, and I think I have vague memories of a gymnastics class.

At any rate, I somehow developed the self-narrative that I was lousy at committing to any practice or training regimen. I always thought it would be so cool to play guitar or learn to skateboard, but I probably wouldn’t be able to stick with it, so why try? Besides, those are things you have to be “cool” to do, and I could never hope to be as cool as Tim Koehler.

Fast forward a dozen years. I served a mission and started college. I learned that for the most part, nobody knows what they’re doing, everyone’s making it up as they go, and my perception of what is truly “cool” was completely wrong. A long-haired 5th grader making weekend plans with his “girlfriend??” Heck, one time I ran into Tim kneeling on the blacktop, dragging the edges of his skateboard across the ground to make it look more weathered. What a poser!

College found me with calloused fingers from playing guitar and banged-up knees from falling off my skateboard. That’s right, I didn’t need to hand-scrape my skateboard—it got plenty scraped up on its own. I was on a roll! I let this momentum carry me as far as it could: I signed up for classes I was interested in even if I didn’t think I’d be any good, I auditioned for and got into BYU’s sketch comedy group, and I even bought some bright-red jeans. Not only did I find new hobbies and passions, but for the first time in a long time, I finally found some creative outlets.

But four years into my college experience, I began to run out of steam as imposter syndrome started creeping back in. I was writing and performing comedy with some amazing new friends, but they were so much more talented than me! I finally found a major and was accepted into BYU’s competitive advertising program only to find myself surrounded by creative people with years of experience—I felt that my newfound creativity paled in comparison.

Recently I’ve been practicing mindful thinking and looking for ways to boost my self-confidence, trying to remind myself that we’re all just making it up as we go along. To this day I still have a hard time getting my skateboard off the ground, and my guitar callouses might fade a little from time-to-time, but I now know that I am cool enough to keep trying.

So if you ever see anyone with a scraped-up skateboard, bear in mind that they could be a seasoned veteran, they could be a newbie learning a new hobbies, or they could be a long-haired fifth grader doing his best to make it up as he goes along, and can we really fault him for that?