I'm so lucky, everything works out for me

"Every man and woman should have the opportunity to go as far as their hard work, individual initiative and competence can take them." These are the words the White House recently used to explain Trump's recent efforts to terminate DEI efforts in our country. 

As we have seen in this course, however, sometimes hard work is not enough. Disadvantaged groups face barriers that keep them from getting to where their hard work could take them. These barriers, and the knowledge of such barriers, have led to first-gen students and other students from disadvantaged backgrounds feeling like it was pure luck that enabled them to achieved the impossible. 

I think often about the mantra/manifestation that was going around social media for a while: "I'm so lucky, everything works out for me." Looking back, I can see this led me to fall into the "Lucky Girl Syndrome"  phenomenon (thank you, S, for inspiring my blog post). 

I had gotten to a point during my law school application journey where I would say "I'm so lucky, everything works out for me" to myself at least once a day in hopes that it would make up for where my application fell short. Once the acceptances started rolling in though, I got scared that it was an accident and that I didn't actually deserve what I had gotten. Looking back now, I can see how "Lucky Girl Syndrome" was ingrained into me for as long as I can remember.  I can even see it going back through generations of my family. 

Like others, I did not know what being "first gen" meant when I was applying to college. I didn't even know when I got there. I remember learning about first generation college students during my first day of orientation and it never occurred to me that I was part of this group. Still, I went to school grateful every day that any school would have just so happened to pick my name out of a stack of applications, let me attend the school, give me money to do so, and award me a diploma at the end of it. 

Looking back, I realize that I was taught to feel lucky to be able to take up space, or to be given any opportunity. Implicit in this, though, is that I didn't earn it, or deserve it, and that I am only ever in any place because of luck and because someone else had let me. I think that at least a little part of this is because of how I was raised. 

Similar to Campoverdi's telling of her family's novenas in Chapter 3, my family turns to God to guide them through hardships. I grew up in an extremely religious family. My family shares the same feelings that every time something good happens to them, it is because they got luck or because God made it happen. When my grandma gave up her own schooling to send her siblings to school and make sure they were taken care of, she said that God blessed her siblings with the education. When my mom went into remission from cancer, it was God who saved her. Every time we didn't lose our house, it was God blessing us. When I began traveling around the country to perform violin with my chamber orchestra, it was God giving me talent to spread his word. When I got into college, it was God giving me a way to use my gifts for good.

I think often about how my family tends to attribute our success to luck or to a higher power when it seems that we shouldn't have worked out in the way that it did. But looking back, what it really comes down to is a willingness to work in spite of and against adversity. It's grit. It's hard work and advocating from me and my family. It's never giving up, even when we've been told no. 

Ultimately, I think a consequence of these mantras - that everything works out for me because I'm lucky, or that my family gets through hardships because God makes it happen - is that in every space I am in, I feel imposter syndrome. I am not there because I worked hard to be here, but because I am lucky or because some higher power made it happen. I am in constant fear of failure because I feel like these spaces are not meant for people like me. These spaces certainly are not built for people like me, so what makes me think I can succeed? 

In fact, the current conversations around increasing DEI in school and employment settings only affirm my imposter syndrome. It is hard to ignore the suggestions that I took a more meritorious student's place (although I do understand that these suggestions entirely misunderstand the place and purpose of DEI) simply because the school was obligated to, or it made them look better. Both constructions suggest I did not earn what I got. 

Luck, religion, and spirituality certainly have their place in big milestones or in overcoming hardship. My family's faith undoubtedly gives us the strength and courage to keep going amidst seemingly never-ending adversity. It gives me the motivation to take up more space and challenge the barriers I face. 

That said, I work everyday on re-shaping this mindset, and I give myself and my family our flowers, so that instead of someone or something else being the reason I am here today, I recognize that it was me and my family working hard, pushing barriers, and never taking that we "can't do it" as an answer.