Chapter 12 First Impression

Cognitive dissonance is something that I think a lot of people experience in their lifetime. For some people, it could be a job. For others, it may be a hobby. Personally, I think I experienced cognitive dissonance the most in middle school. Middle school is the place where grades don’t really matter, but everyone encourages you to do well, but you have no motivation to do so. Looking back on it, middle school was probably not the most fun of times, but I still tell myself that it would be great to go back. There are no rewards for getting good grades or being a good person. There is only the self satisfaction of being better than some other people, and being able to show off your grades. I think this is why I have convinced myself that middle school was such a great time. It is very possible that middle school could have been an awesome time, the best years of my life, but I highly doubt it. I had no real motivation to do well, except my parents, but besides that, it’s not like anything that happened in middle school is prevalent today. Whether I got an A or an A- in my 7th grade history class does not matter. The reward of getting good grades and doing well in middle school is so small that I think I just convinced myself over the years that middle school was a great time and that I would love to go back, when in reality it probably wasn’t as fun as I make it out to be.