www.raleene.com: high school = discernment

My answer to this Formspring question became too lengthy so I made a blog post about it instead!

What was your high school experience like? Did you enjoy your high school experience? What did you learn from it?

Loved high school! I've always loved school and I'm thankful that my parents brought us up to do really well and work hard for our grades. Wasn't allowed to go out much, never tried clubbing. My parents were strict, in a good way. :)

I was always a part of the committee for all the events and performed a lot... Sometimes I would even work backstage AND perform at the same time in our school productions. I had so much fun! I didn't really get much sleep though. Aside from our extra-curricular activities, I also had to maintain a GPA of 90+. I was quite a perfectionist during my grade school years but I mellowed down during high school since I wanted to perform, too... Thankfully I managed to maintain the GPA I wanted. Was also in the student council, prom committee, etc. Our school's reaalllyyyyyyy small (24 in class, and we were 45 in the graduating batch) so the ones who were into the extra-curricular whatnots automatically worked for every committee...

I learned A LOT about myself and people during my final year in high school. I was pretty happy-go-lucky as a friend and student, but was really strict as a leader. Yeah, I pretty much scared people and we sorta needed that to win all the competitions. Thankfully I don't have to do that now :)) . I discovered that my personality was totally different from the other girls. Mum never told me that she knew it all along, but I'm more of a thinker than a "feeler". I wasn't afraid to voice out my opinions, and during my senior year I found out that some girls get offended easily. I hate gossiping and trash-talking (things said out of spite, not based on facts). I was more of a logical thinker and liked analyzing the good and bad behavior of my peers, so I pretty much learned to understand why some girls started saying negative things about me. I never entertained those things because I never started fights with anybody and I knew I never did anything wrong. High school is when most people have the tendency to be immature, so they misinterpret a lot of your actions and say unnecessary things. Some people also thrive for drama!

I became closer to the guys in my class since we pretty much had the same outlook about everything. They also helped me shield myself from all the drama that was unnecessarily developing during the last few months of our senior year (ugh how very timely haha). I still maintained good relationships with the rest of my classmates, although I was kinda hurt cos of some of the things they said about me (for some strange reason, I always end up knowing what was up with everyone since people would just randomly tell me- that happens up to this day!). My final year was still very fun and we managed to work with each other really well! My friends also helped me start a more meaningful relationship with God. By slowly letting go of my happy-go-lucky mentality (which made me think that everyone around me was nice and friendly), I learned to be more cautious about trusting just anyone and I became more focused about what I wanted to achieve in life.

I can ramble on about my high school experience but to sum it up:

I learned that being an exceptional student is not enough to succeed and live a happy, meaningful life. You need real friends who are passionate about the same things (for me it's faith/spirituality, family, meaningful relationships, global awareness, social responsibility and a never-ending eagerness to learn, gain more knowledge and wisdom). Grades are just numbers. A single event can change your life. Your definition of wealth should not be about "cash". You shouldn't care about what other people think about you (that will not contribute to your success!). Getting advice from people is good, but those shouldn't serve as instructions- YOU have to decide for yourself. Trust noone but yourself.

Plus I learned a lot of things about myself.

I can get pretty insensitive. Although this is a good thing on some cases, it's also important to show compassion and be concerned about the things that matter. Okay, I am not sappy or sensitive. It's my responsibility to use that trait to make better decisions (think with your brain, not with your heart!) and act better than others. I have learned that not all people (especially girls) think like me and my friends, so I have to be more cautious about what to say. I cannot force people to change and think like me, but I want to influence other people to stop judging others and have a more positive outlook in life. Whenever I don't do well in something, I cringe at the idea of feeling sorry for myself, sulking and blaming others cos that will get you nowhere- a total waste of time. If I wanna see some changes, I have to initiate change. With meaningful relationships, I will start a trend. I will succeed and LIVE.

I signed up for modern jazz the summer before entering high school to lose weight (major problem for me ever since grade school!). After that, I got hooked!

QUASAR (Math&Science club) trip to Guimaras island :)

One of those high school dances we had to organize

LOVED folk dance competitions.

LOL this was before everyone got Macbooks. Check out Car and Rizbelle with the little English-Korean dictionary! LOL!

During the "Party to End Poverty" event our school organised

my "office". Typical scene especially during thesis crunch time.

The only sport I was into

Campaigning is always fun! And winning, too! :))

home ec class/TWE (teaching work ethics)- our group always got the highest grades! LOL we had to make a model house once and when I found out our teacher was so impressed with our glass house, I felt like I could prolly enjoy Interior Design :P

Powernapping after the cheer dance competition and participating in the Sportsfest! Forrealz :P (we always won the cheer dance competitions!)

music class <3

Organizing the grade school parties

Our last high school dance :)

Rewarding ourselves with Pipo's Ice Cream after circling Mabolo, going door-to-door to distribute flyers for this final thesis we had to do (helped an underprivileged family- micro-entrepreneurship)

Issa and I always did the makeup for school productions

Forgot the name of our "crew". LOL

Do they take your crown after prom? Our school does that. Crowns and batons are only lent to the winners :)) I think I only got a Parker pen with something engraved on it. :))