Veritas

As a child, I was better than my peers, and because of that, expectations wrapped themselves around my life before I ever understood what they meant. I was constantly reminded that I was different, that certain mistakes were not meant for me. “Don’t do this, you’re too smart,” they would say. “I don’t expect this from you.” Those words, meant as praise, slowly became walls. I was not allowed the freedom to be a child, to be careless, to fail loudly and learn quietly. Even my father’s favorite saying, “With great power comes great responsibility,” echoed through my life like a command. Yet I often wondered what power I truly had. Was it simply that I learned faster, that information came easily to me, that my mind moved quicker than those around me? Was that enough to demand perfection from a boy who still wanted to play, to be careless, to be free?

So I did what was expected of me. I shined. I pushed myself forward and left behind the softness of childhood. I climbed ladders faster than I should have, stepping into classrooms filled with older students, sitting in spaces my peers would not enter for years. At first, it felt like victory, like proof that I was special. But slowly, silently, the pressure began to choke me. Every test felt like a verdict on my worth. Every mistake felt unforgivable. The anxiety of having to always perform, always be impressive, always justify my place in those rooms began to eat away at me from the inside.

Eventually, I found a way to escape. I stopped trying. I flunked intentionally. I buried my brilliance beneath jokes and noise. I became the class jester, the one who made people laugh, the one who disrupted lessons just enough to be noticed for the wrong reasons. My grades settled into mediocrity, and I told myself that this was freedom. My mother would look at me with disappointment and frustration and remind me that I was not average, that she knew what I was capable of. And she was right. I knew it too. But knowing only made it harder. I believed it was safer to be underestimated than to be expected to soar. Failure hurt less when no one was watching closely.

So I wasted time. High school passed in laughter and laziness. I paid attention just enough to survive, just enough to avoid complete collapse. I was arrogant enough to believe I could return to greatness whenever I wanted, that my intelligence was a switch I could flip back on at will. I told myself I had time, that this version of me was temporary, that one day I would change and everything would fall back into place.

That illusion shattered the day I tried to study seriously for an exam and realized I could not. I sat down with my books, determined to focus, but within minutes my hands reached for distractions. A tablet. A game. Anything to avoid the discomfort of effort. I told myself I was choosing not to focus, that I could lock in whenever I wanted. Deep down, though, fear crept in. What if I had broken something inside myself? What if comfort had made me weak?

Still, I continued living that way because it was easy. Mediocrity was warm and familiar. It asked nothing of me. Slowly, the titles that once followed my name disappeared. “Best in class” was replaced with “lazy.” “Disturbs the peace.” Those words settled into my identity, and I wore them like armor, pretending they did not hurt.

I carried that same emptiness into university. The freedom there only magnified my flaws. I flunked some classes and barely passed others, still convinced that this was not the real me, that I could change whenever I chose. One day, as I reached for my phone to doomscroll again, I caught my reflection in the mirror. And something inside me broke. I felt a deep, burning hatred for the person staring back at me. I saw A man who had promised to change a hundred times and never did, someone who had given up on himself, someone who refused greatness because he was afraid of it. Someone still running from the shadow of a gifted child he no longer believed in.

That hatred did not destroy me. It ignited me. Out of sheer disgust with myself, I opened my books and read for three hours straight. It was painful. It was uncomfortable. But it was honest. That single act became the spark that carried me through the semester, and the results were beautiful, not just on paper, but in how I felt about myself. For the first time in a long while, I felt capable again.

I decided then that I would try, truly try, without hiding behind jokes or excuses. I refused to be remembered as mediocre, as lazy, as wasted potential. That would not be my legacy. As I committed to becoming better, a heavy burden was lifted from my chest. I no longer feared the version of myself that could be great. I stopped running from him and began to chase him. I studied his habits, his discipline, and his courage, and I made them my own.

I stopped aiming for what was comfortable. I stopped settling for the roof. I began reaching for the stars. I no longer made excuses for who I had been. I chose change deliberately and painfully, not just for myself, but for everyone who believed in me when I could not believe in myself.

I am Isaiah. This is my veritas.