8th Grade - R. Hillel Eisenberg - TorahAnytime.com

When I was in eighth grade, I had a grand total of one boy in my grade, and that was me. For whatever reason in Rochester where I grew up, there was one kid who moved, there was one kid who was Lubavitch, he went to Crown Heights to learn. I was the only kid in my grade. So, I had a cabrusa with myself. My academic rival was me. So, some classes I was in the seventh graders with the with them, but for other classes that I already took, I did what they called self-study in the office, which was their nice way of saying, "Here's a massive Rebbe Royal wine history book, and go write essays about it." So, there I am in eighth grade, which is the sort of the prime social year of your life, basically, where you should be going to your friends' bar mitzvah parties and hanging out and getting into trouble with your friends, and there I am pathetically in the office. There's the secretary and the principal, and then there's me, and I'm sitting there writing essays like I'm a retired professor. So, I'm there. It's kind of pathetic, but I'm sort of soaking my way through this year. And there was a woman, an elderly lady, her name was Mrs. Sandy Edison, who was sort of a educational adviser in the school, which is a fancy way of saying she cared for all the people that no one had time to care for. And she sits down across my desk, they gave me a little desk in the office, one day, and she says, "I know this stinks, but I want to tell you a perspective that I think could change this." She says, "You are given an opportunity right now that most people will never have in their lifetime, and that is to discover and become comfortable with themselves. Because most people your age, they see she said, are so caught up, have no mental space for themselves, they are way too busy fitting in to discover and become comfortable with themselves. There's no mental space. But you do not have peer pressure because you don't have peers. So this could be an opportunity for you to soak and get depressed or you can learn an ancient art of discovering your own soul, your strength, your weaknesses, what you like, what you're good at. And you will have no peer pressure distracting you. She gets up and she walks away. I still think till this day that is the greatest piece of advice I've ever received from anyone.