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Your post is a brilliant example of what I'm talking about. People who just don't get it.</p>
<p>While you basically concede that everything I've said is accurate, you still have a problem with my post. Why? Because you don't like confronting the truth? Because you can't handle the fact that your present problems are ultimately minute and trivial?</p>
<p>Because accepting the truth would actually entail losing your victim mentality and not complaining incessantly about your problems?
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<p>Words like "minute" and "trivial" are highly relative- someone can be totally devastated over the loss of his/her first girlfriend/boyfriend, even though they may ever well find "The One" (Yay Neo! :P) later on in life. Or someone who loses a limb or has surgery could think they are in the absolute dumps of life until someone comes along who's dying of cancer and says "Your problems are minute and trivial, get over it". etc etc. Bit extreme examples, but i think you know what i'm getting at.</p>
<p>And a victim mentality? Umm... if you could point that out for me, I would much appreciate it- I like to think I have control of my own actions and behaviors and if I did in fact demonstrate a victim mentality, I certainly had no intention of having a victim mentality, and I apologize- just please point it out where in my post I demonstrated that. :)</p>
<p>One extreme side says "It doesn't matter, get over it", another side says "It's my life, it meant everything to me to go there"- the real point, i <em>think</em> anyway, is that this matters, but onnly in how you react to it- IMHO,someone who got in and says "It was my dream and my life and I'm so happy to have fulfilled my dream!" is perhaps taking as unfulfilling an attitude towards the decision as someone who says "it was my life and my dream and now I can't fulfill it".</p>
<p>On the other hand, someone who says "Bah I got in, I dont care, I would have been happy at any school" is probably takign jsut as much of an unfulfilling approach as soemone who says "I didnt get in, I don't care, I never cared for MIT anyway".</p>
<p>I think the most fulfilling attitude lies somewhree at an intersection of those four quadrants :)</p>
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The best part of your post is where you say that you respect me since I'm a Caltech student.</p>
<p>That's terrible. You should never respect or disrespect anyone because of the college they attend(ed). It's a horrible measure of an individual's true character or worth.
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<p>I guess you prove yourself correct; no matter how good an institution like CalTech is, it doesnt say anything about the respect deserved of the people who attend there. Take yourself, for example.</p>
<p><burn> ;) </burn></p>
<p>Okay, all kidding aside: I never said that I respected you more or less for attending CalTech, but what I <em>guess</em> I was trying to say was that: Most (not all!) of the less sensitive people on these forums- the ones that say "suck it up", "its not going to matter, get a life and stop whining" etc etc tend to be the ones that got into the institution of their choice anyway, or something very close besides. It's hardly fair to expect someone to react well to such advice under <em>any</em> circumstances, but when its coming from people who got into the institution of their choice (or who make it seem as if they are at the institution of their choice) and proseletyze and say "Get over it, this doesn't matter"- well, lets just say that that sort of an attitude tends to decrease people's respect for both you and your advice for extremely obvious reasons.</p>
<p>In other words: You're not helping, and you're probably only exacerbating the problem.</p>
<p>And i never, ever judge people basedon their status- only on their actions. Based on our interaction thus far, draw your own conclusion as to what sort of character I believe you have.</p>