The most dangerous thing one can do upon planet Earth is to tell another man he is inferior, for such a man will do anything and everything to prove his accuser wrong.
So it was with myself and Mathematics. When in high school I confessed my desire to become a mathematician, the other children in the class told me I was a "dumbsh*t", and teased me, and threw things at me. To them I was a clown, and they treated me accordingly.
The very next year, though, I had left that hellhole of underachievers behind, and had embarked upon a nascent campaign of science and mathematics that ultimately propelled me to academic heights I once could only have dreamt of.
But a stubborn question still lingered in the dark recesses of my own mind: If I had not been so maligned over my dream as an adolescent, would I have so fanatically pursued it well into middle age? To this day I know not the answer to that question; only that the overall experience served as a reticent yet profound motivational force throughout the rest of my life.
Ultimately, I do not want to acknowledge the possibility that my most hated of foes could have had so much power over me. I want to believe that I have been the sole master of my own destiny. And yet, the possibility still haunts me from one day to the next, to the point where I do not think I will ever have the confidence to permanently discredit it. For, if true, then how pointless might my ambitions really be?
Regardless, it is my hope that anyone reading this will learn that it is better to complement another human being than it is to insult them. Because maybe -- just maybe -- such malice will have ignited a mighty Crusade which eventually dwarfs one's original pettiness.
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