An empath's thoughts on pass-fail systems

My husband asked me yesterday what I thought of pass-fail systems (in that tone of voice that clearly indicated he thinks this is one of those stupid-is-spreading ideas and does NOT APPROVE.)  And I had to say, as a student, that I think they are wonderful -- at least for someone like me.

I have spent my entire life trying to please other people.  Especially my parents, who held success in school to be a VERY desirable thing.  And I remember my father telling me (though I'm not certain how old I was at the time) that the way to be successful in school is to figure out what the teacher wants and give it to them.  Yes, the teacher may be stupid or a jerk or whatever, but they are the ones who grade you, and you need good grades to get ahead in the world, so figure out what they want and give it to them.

I suppose the good news is I took that to heart, and as a result, was reasonably successful in school.  The bad news is that theory definitely contributed to this "work to please someone else" phenomenon that seems to be handicapping me at this point in my life.

So the truth is, having been raised in that environment, I actually find pass-fail systems utterly freeing.  I mean, I know I'm going to pass -- it's just common sense.  I show up, I do the work, I turn it in on time, and I put some thought and energy into it.

But since it's a reasonably automatic pass, I don't have to worry (beyond showing up and doing the work and putting thought and energy into it) about pleasing the teacher; about getting the citation format exactly right, or delivering the right messages, or covering all the bases.  What I DO get to worry about -- or rather, indulge myself in -- is figuring it all out: what did I actually learn?  What did I get out of this course, and where exactly did it come from?  Who said the magic words that gave me a dose of enlightenment, and what exactly WERE those words?

Do you have any idea how amazing it is to be able to approach final papers from that perspective?  I feel like I'm absolutely exploding with awareness right now; my discoveries, when I put all my notes and readings together, were SO EXCITING!  And the fact is, I'm still processing.

But in discussions last night and today, discussions that flow out of this simple question about pass-fail systems, I'm learning -- or rediscovering -- some interesting things about myself and about my view of the world, and also about how that view has both protected and handicapped me over the years.  And it's all tangled up with this idea of having to please others.  Which turns out to be a two-edged sword.

The bad part of having been raised to sense other's needs and meet them is that it can be challenging (if you are this sort of person) to figure out who YOU are and what YOU want, where YOU ends and OTHER begins. You are so busy being a mirror, reflecting others' needs, that you're not certain anything lies behind the mirror; you "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain" because you're just too busy making sure everyone else is getting what they need.

In my case this comes primarily from having a mother who needed to have the world revolve around her; from having -- in self-defense -- to anticipate all her moods and needs in order to survive.   But the good news is that this is a very useful skill: it could conceivably make me a wonderful bridge for whole communities of people, to help move them forward from now to next in a way they barely detect.  People like us are pretty unthreatening, because we never try to make folks move more than a step or two from where they are.

But what that also means, I think, is we hold the space of their being.  So when someone or something comes in that is a major disturbance WE are the ones who start vibrating, because we can feel the tension between what's coming and what is before anyone else is aware there's any change in the wind at all.  And because we feel the pain of that tension so deeply, we become sensitized to change, not so much because we're afraid of change (we may actually embrace it!) but because we know what it's going to feel like for everyone else. 

There's more, I think, to ponder about this.  But that's my thinking for this morning; for what it's worth...  and some days -- well -- it kinda makes me feel like I'm from some other planet!