I rarely use the word dumb or stupid in my vocabulary. Maybe once in a year I’ll call someone a “dumbass” behind his or her back but that’s such a rare occasion. I might tease a friend who’s being smart with me and call him a “smartass” or “punk” but I rarely criticize people for being dumb or stupid. My philosophy is that there are so many ways to be intelligent, I’ll just give people the general benefit of the doubt that they’re either having an off day or that ____ is not their area of expertise. Making people feel less than or stupid for not knowing something is not encouraging them to learn so if in fact they are dumb, making them FEEL dumb would only exacerbate their uh condition.
I had an exboyfriend who used to make me feel so dumb. A habit he had that is kind of common is when someone asks a definitive question, he’ll guffaw and say, “You don’t know that?!” He did this to me so often that I started to feel dumb. Also we had a lot of the same classes and whenever I did better than him he would get upset and say things like, “How did you get an A? I basically taught you everything.” Once in a lab, I calculated my standard deviation and got an extremely low number. A low standard deviation, just in case you didn’t know, means the variance is low which in turn means you were relatively consistent in your experiment. It’s a good thing. He was so shocked by my low standard deviation, he pulled out a calculator and recalculated my SD. Being really young, instead of feeling insulted, I just felt dumb.
After our relationship ended, the healthier mirrors of my peers, friends, professors, mentors, and colleagues outshone the previous reflection of the condescending mirror my exboyfriend gave me. I no longer perceive myself as dumb but as someone who is always learning. Because of my experience with this relationship, I am now super careful with how I interact with people. Whenever someone asks me a question, I consciously never make them uncomfortable for not knowing something. If I know the answer, I gently tell them making sure the tone and inflection of my voice is not judgmental. This is pretty hard sometimes when I run across something I find bizarre. For instance, if you didn’t watch Jersey Shore or know what it is, I might have to bite back a, “What?! You’ve never heard of Jersey Shore?!”
Just kidding. What a dumb show.
Question: When was the last time you felt dumb? What did you learn?
*** This blog post was written in conjunction with this week’s writing prompt.