I loved this excerpt and letter I came across in a book I was reading called “Against Wind and Tide”, by Ann Morrow Lindbergh (the wife of well known Charles Lindbergh).
It was a letter addressed to her son Land, who recently started university at Stanford.
I liked how she emphasized that “college marks are not a criterion of character or intelligence or success in life“. I totally concur with this. Some of the smartest and most successful people I know (in my eyes), did not necessarily do well or enjoy the academic side of University or School.
She explains how when she was at University, she “felt there was no time for thought, for life, for any kind of creative work, or find the time to be outdoors, etc.” . I too also felt this when I was at university over a decade and a half ago. There was so much I wanted to do, to experience, and people I wanted to spend more time with; yet the opportunity to spend more time mastering the material, would weigh on me and often pull me from the simple pleasures.
I very much like the following advice she gave her son as she concluded her letter, which I wish I read 20 years ago and which I hope my sons will read if and when they go to University:
“if you can, don’t go on at this pace – let up a little – even the marks. Set a limit for yourself. Work just so hard, and then get but and away from it. Accept the fact that you’re not an A-student, or a B-student. It doesn’t mean you have a lower intelligence – you’re not in that narrow groove, that’s all. Use your intelligence to live balanced”.
So wise and in my opinion, such good advice.
So here is the Letter:
Shiri