I was not bad at school because I was dull. I struggled because I did not understand what I was being taught. Growing up, I had serious difficulty with subjects like Mathematics, Economics, Chemistry, Physics and anything that leaned heavily on numbers, formulas or abstract scientific ideas. Not because I refused to learn, but because no one ever stopped to ask how I learned or why I was struggling. Understanding was never the goal. Passing was.
In school, failing to understand was treated as disobedience. I remember being flogged for failing mathematics. I remember being punished for not passing economics and government. Not once did it occur to anyone that a child could be intelligent and still not grasp what was being taught the way it was being taught.
Meanwhile, I excelled in subjects like History, Literature-in-English, CRK and English language. I loved definitions. I loved stories. I loved knowing how things came to be, why people behaved the way they did, and how past events shaped the present. But those strengths were rarely acknowledged. In the system I grew up in, intelligence had a narrow definition, and I did not fit it.
Instead of being helped, I was labelled. Instead of being taught, I was punished. That was how fear replaced curiosity. That fear followed me for years.
By the time I got to secondary school, learning had become something I associated with anxiety and shame. I did badly, not because I was incapable, but because I no longer trusted myself. Repeating classes, being moved around and constantly being compared to others made me believe that I was “behind.” I internalised other people’s judgments and stopped believing in my own ability to think.
It was when I entered the university and studied Mass Communication that something shifted. For the first time, I realised I could write. I could think. I could analyse. I could express ideas clearly. The intelligence I was told I lacked suddenly became visible, not because I had changed, but because the environment finally allowed me to function in my own language.
This experience is not unique.
Many people study courses they are good at. Some even graduate with strong results. Yet years later, they are not practising what they studied; not because they failed, but because survival demanded something else. Jobs were unavailable. Industries were unstable. Pay was not livable. Opportunity did not meet preparation.
So people adapted.
A person can study one thing and end up doing another and still be intelligent, capable and serious. Not practising what you studied is not the same as not using what you learned. Skills transfer. Thinking transfers. Perspective transfers. The real tragedy is not the pivot itself, but the shame attached to it, as though adapting to survive is a moral failure.
Today, I teach catechism classes, and I see the same patterns repeating themselves early. Children are encouraged to memorise answers rather than understand concepts. They are rewarded for repeating textbook language word for word, even when they do not grasp its meaning. Many of them struggle not because they are lazy, but because they do not understand what they are learning, and no one is patient enough to slow down and explain.
Some children learn by memorisation. Others learn by understanding. Our system prioritises the former and punishes the latter. The consequences do not end in school. They follow people into adulthood.
In today’s world, the pressure has simply changed shape. We are told that everyone must understand money, monetisation, analytics and online income. Content creation has become the new compulsory subject. If you are not visible, not trending, not monetising your talent, then you are seen as wasting your potential.
But just like in school, not everyone learns, works or thrives in the same way. Not everyone wants to be a content creator. Not everyone wants to dance online, share their private life, or turn their personality into a brand. Some people are private. Some people prefer structure, routine and stable employment. Some people thrive in offices, behind desks, working quietly and consistently. There is nothing inferior about this.
Yet society increasingly frames these preferences as failure.
At the same time, we are told that we must “learn money,” “learn economics,” and “learn math,” but rarely are we taught how these things relate to our real lives. We are forced to memorise formulas instead of being shown how economics affects daily choices, how money systems work, or how mathematics can serve us practically.
This is why books like Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and The Richest Man in Babylon resonate with so many people. Not because they provide perfect answers, but because they explain systems in human language. They show that it is possible to do what you love while still meeting your needs, something our formal education rarely demonstrates.
I am interested in making money. I am interested in surviving and living well. But I am also cautious. I have been told many times that my writing could earn me money, yet I fear that turning it immediately into a product may drain it of joy. Platforms demand payment before exposure. Others demand conformity to trends. There is always the fear of exploitation, theft, or being told that your voice is not what the market wants.
So the question becomes deeper than money. Why must survival always come at the cost of identity? Why are people constantly forced to become something they are not, simply because it is profitable or trending at the moment?
We are evolving, yes. But evolution should not mean erasure. Progress should not mean abandoning who we are. A society that values only visibility, virality, and monetisation risks losing quiet thinkers, careful writers, reflective minds, and people who contribute in less performative ways.
Maybe the problem is not that people refuse to adapt. Maybe the problem is that the systems we are adapting to do not make room for difference.
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Featured Image by Rdne for Pexels
