How does Outliers connect to MY life?

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell is unlike any other non-fiction book that you will ever read. Unlike most other non-fiction books Outliers explores many questions that people have and then answers them in a way that you can make connections with your own life. Outliers also perfects takings small facts and gives them important meaning. Unlike most non-fiction books Malcolm Gladwell does a fantastic job connecting the Outliers to your own life.

I was born on January 11th, 1996.  On this particular date in Albany a blizzard was raging outside. And as the blizzard raged on I was born into the world. Little did my parents know that me being born in January could be very beneficial to me. As Malcolm explains in Outliers about professional hockey players; "40 percent of the players will have been born between January and March, 30 percent between April and June, 20 percent between July and September and 10 percent between October and December."(23) Malcolm explains in the book how most hockey players are born between January and March due to the fact that the Hockey cutoff in Canada is January 1st. This means that kids born on January 2nd who are much more developed are playing against kids born in December who are much less developed. Thus the more developed kids perform better usually and are chosen for the all-star teams, where they get extra help that kids who weren't chosen won’t get. In a way I can relate to this. When I used to play baseball (I don't anymore), I was in a league with the kids who are now 11th graders. I had to play with these kids because my birthday made the cutoff date. So really I was playing against a lot of kids who were much more mature than me and whose skills were much finer tuned than mine. So throughout my baseball career I got side stepped when it came to getting extra help and getting chosen for all star teams. So partly because of when my birthday is I never really got a fair chance at baseball, or as fair of a chance as kids who missed the cutoff and were some of the older kids in there league. Also I have noticed that a large amount of my very close friends have birthdays relativity close to mine. My birthday is January 11th while a close friend of mine; Marc du Moulin's birthday is in March. Relativity close to my birthday. Also another close friend of mine; Matt Pasquali's birthday is in December, very close to my birthday. I also have close friends with birthdays in the summer but it seems to me like my birth date has a very big impact on my life.

Another idea that Malcolm Gladwell goes in depth about in Outliers is the 10,000 hour rule. Gladwell explains the rule in Outliers; "The emerging picture from such studies is that ten thousand hours is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world class expert."(40) Gladwell also states how it takes around ten years to achieve the ten thousand hours; " And what’s ten years? Well, it's roughly how long it takes to put in ten thousand hours of hard practice."(41) Even though I am nowhere near 10,000 hours of practice in anything this rule still shows very true in my life. Last year in 9th grade is started running a lot. I joined cross country and then cross country skiing and then track as well. All of these sports involve running a lot. Anyways in cross country I was not a very good runner at all. It was really the first time I had ever run more than a mile in my life and I was damn hard! But as the cross country season progressed I started getting better at running and by the time track came around I was a whole different person. By the end of track I had a mile time of 5:17, a huge jump from my previous record of 6:13 that fall. This just shows how much I progressed when I put in hour of practice. I was very slow when I first started and I didn't really have any hours of running under my belt. But by that spring I had not a lot but more hours than that fall and it really showed. Also I feel like this rule helps to show why seniors are much better athletes on average than freshmen. Take away the fact that most seniors are much more mature than freshmen they also have a lot more hours of practice under their belts. So when freshmen are coming into sports they are physically behind seniors but they are also lacking the hours that seniors have.

One more part of Outliers that I can relate to is the part about the plane crashes. Let’s  make this clear I have never been in a plane crash but for most of that part of the book I was able to relate my own life with it. In this part of outliers Gladwell talks about plane crashes and why they happen,  he talks about a plane being flown by two Colombians and why it crashes. And he narrows it down to a large reason that is that the Colombian co-pilot didn't want to take back to the captain. In the book Galdwell explains; "Klotz sees himself as a subordinate. It's not his job to solve the crisis. It's the captains." (207) This shows that the Colombian feels like since he is a co-pilot he doesn't have to deal with the plane crashing. This situation really backs up the facts that Gladwell  talks about in the book. In Outliers Gladwell talks about PDI; "Power distance is concerned with attitudes toward hierarchy, specifically with how much a particular culture values and respects authority." (205) In the PDI rankings the United States is ranked in the top five lowest. Meaning we don't have that much respect towards authority. This doesn't come as a surprise to me at all. Actually I would sort of expect that we wouldn't have that much respect towards authority. All throughout my life I have always been taught that if you disagree with something someone is saying you call them out on it and then you work out the problem. I feel like in other countries they are not taught this. They are taught that whatever a higher figure says is correct. But this is not true in America. We are thought to question authority. As American s we want our own way and I am no exception to this. I can remember a number of occasions where a teacher or my parents said something that I disagreed with and then I questioned them on it. Saying something like "I don't think you are right." This would be unheard of in a country like Brazil, which has a very high PDI. Throughout my life I have been taught to question authority and that is why our very low PDI comes as no surprise to me.

Unlike most other non-fiction books outliers explores many questions that people have and then answers them in a way that you can make connections with your own life. And throughout reading Outliers I was able to connect what Gladwell was saying to my own life. In my opinion Gladwell did a fantastic job with this book and it is unlike any other non-fiction book I have ever read. Throughout this book I learned that people don't become successful just because. They became successful because they got very lucky and because they were able to take advantage of situations that others didn't see. Reading this book really helped me to realize how lucky I am and how like many others how I am in some sorts, an outlier.

Perspective Poetry Prompt

Apple:

You were once the beauty of my eye
But now you only make me cry
Why oh why did you have to die

You used to be so vibrant and red
But now you seem gray since he's been dead
Every night miss you not in our bed

You are perfectly round
It’s painful to not have you around

Everything I do
Reminds me of you

And now I can't even see the beauty in anything
Even this simple apple

Microfiction

I walked to school today. Let’s just say that it is defiantly the last time that I will ever do that again. It all started when my bus missed my stop this morning. That was weird to me because in my 10 years of school my bus has never missed me. Anyways after it missed I went back to my house to ask my parents for a ride. When I asked my mom she said that I would have to walk. I live around a mile from the school so it doesn't take that long to walk there. Even though it wouldn't take that long I was still pissed. It was November and it was getting cold outside and the last thing I wanted to do was walk a mile to school. But I had to so I begrudgingly started walking to school. As soon as I started walking I felt something was off. I was abnormally paranoid and I kept finding myself turning around and looking for something that wasn't there. Then all of a sudden out of my peripheral vision I saw him. He was just standing there, very formally. He was dressed in a full on tuxedo with a top hat and a bow tie. And I remember the stare he was giving me. Oh that stare still makes me shudder. After seeing the man I started to run, I was freaked out. I was running as hard as I could, practically sprinting. In the far distance I could see the school appearing over the trees. Then out of nowhere he appeared again about 20 feet ahead of me. "Where did he come from" I thought. By then I was freaking out. I frantically looked to my left and right to see a way around him but by the time I looked back towards him he was gone. After that sighting is sprinted the rest of the way to school. I was almost petrified with fear throughout the whole day. Today was the first day that I ever walked to school. And I want to make something very clear; it is defiantly the last time I will ever walk to school.

TU Tuesday- Editorial

http://www.timesunion.com/default/article/PRO-CON-VIEW-Should-Ryan-Braun-be-stripped-of-2398261.php


Evaluate a speaker’s point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric, identifying any fallacious reasoning or exaggerated or distorted evidence.

A few days ago news came out that last season’s MVP of the national league in baseball, Ryan Braun tested positive for HGH (human growth hormone.) Apparently he tested positive for these substances during the baseball playoffs. According to the test Braun's level of synthetic HGH was higher than any other test. Braun's statement is that he did not take any HGH substances but the chips seemed to be stacked against him. In the editorial it shows both views of the story. But it shows one view as their view. In their view they claim "But if the Milwaukee Brewers slugger cannot reverse the ruling that currently stands, he should be stripped of this honor." I cannot agree more with this statement they go on to make an example of why if Braun is convicted of this he should have his MVP award striped "This should be a no-brainer, just as in the Olympics, where any medal winner who fails a drug test is immediately disqualified." This is yet another fantastic point. They also say that if he proves them wrong than he more than deserves to keep his award. They go on to give reasoning to why even if he is convicted that he should keep his award. They say "Even if the original ruling stands, there's no way of knowing how any improper substance affected Braun's play." This is a valiant point but is strongly disagree with it. In my opinion if Braun is proven that he cheated then he should immediately be stripped of his MVP award.

My T-Shirt Vote

Chocolate Chip