Summary
The excerpt was basically about monsters, but not the literal thing. Monsters, based on how the mother tried to explain it, were problems in life. Her child was getting worried of the lurking monster beneath the bed, even though the mother knows that there is not really any monster. She had this dilemma whether she would tell her son that there is not really any monster beneath the bed or she would just let him discover it all by himself, much like how a child would discover that Santa Claus is not anywhere close to real when he grows up. She suddenly remembers and relates the monsters to life problems and had basically the same dilemma of whether she would open her son’s eyes to how it is really like to live in this world, or let him grow up first and let it realize by himself.
Describe something you had to learn on your own, because it could not or should not have been taught to you by someone else. Explain why the situation had to occur that way and its significance in defining something about you.
The moment I was asked this question, there was one immediate thing that came into my mind as the perfect answer. One thing I learned on my own that could not have been taught to me was how to respect other people, outside my family. Almost every child believes that they are the center of the universe, at least of their “own” universe. It is very common for a child to be selfish and egocentric.
Children do not usually know how to show respect because they usually think they do not have to, again, because they, or in this case, I, thought I was the center of the universe. I was wrong. As I grew older, I realized to myself that I was never the center of the universe, even if sometimes I call it my own. At home, my parents and elder siblings would give me whatever I want. At times, they reward me for my obedience, honesty, and basically every positive behavior; in the same manner, they punish me for disrespecting them, and basically for every negative behavior I exhibit. This is why it is turned out so different and hard to learn how to respect other people aside from the members of my family. It literally took me years to discover that I have to respect every people I meet, the ones who are younger than me, and especially the older ones; otherwise, everyone would definitely hate me, which even a selfish and egocentric child would not want. At home, my parents would simply punish me whenever I show disrespectful qualities. Because of that negative reinforcement, I was easily able to swiftly learn that the right thing to do is to show respect to my parents by consciously knowing that I would get punished if I were to fight back, or do anything disrespectful towards them. Everything about respect became more complicated when I started to go to school. I, of course, did not have my parents inside the school to negatively reinforce me about the right and wrong things to do, so everything from that point—from the point where I first went to school, was thanks to my self-learning abilities. My parents and my elder siblings were not there to teach me that I should respect other people just like how I respect them. As a child, I wanted to be liked and I hated to be disliked, just like how a normal child would. These wants greatly contributed to my learning achievements during my first few months at school. Even with these contributories, it still took me years to realize that respect not only for your family, but also for others, is a must. This is the one thing that I have learned as a child, but still remains true even after so many years. Learning by yourself can prove to be very hard and confusing. But when I first realized this particular thing about respect, I thought that I would not give it so much meaning if I learned it from my parents—via their positive and negative feedback-based strategies, instead of learning it all by myself, which I did. It was a product of trial and error observations, analysis, and a lot of confusions—things that a child would never make efforts in accomplishing. This has been very significant for me since I was a child, and even up to now. Back then, majority of my classmates and teachers liked me—perhaps because of how respectful I am, and up until now, those and more and more people still find me pleasant, which of course, is a good thing.
