As I'm sure you've already noticed from my picture, I'm not so tough on the eyes. Hell, I might as well just come out and say it: I'm devastatingly attractive-there's just no way around it.
Now one thing that has always bothered me about being this good looking is that people tend to assume that my looks are responsible for me being the most popular kid at Duke. The fact is that while my looks definitely don't hurt (especially with the ladies), my coolness is a result of a lot more than just chiseled features and a sculpted, hairless body.
I like to think that my popularity is the result of a number of random traits that came together within me to form a sort of "perfect storm" of coolness. People are always coming up to me and saying things like, "Jake, it seems as though you are the embodiment of everything I've ever wanted to be. How can I be more like you?" Although I usually don't have an answer for them, I think that a lot of times just looking at me tends to help.
There's no denying it-I know cool, because I am cool. Through my explorations of coolness during the last few years, I have come to the conclusion that many kids at Duke are not reaching their true potential for coolness because they are too self-conscious.
Self-consciousness is something that afflicts all of us on some level. It stops us from doing things we all want to do like dancing in Alpine or volunteering at magic shows or saying something when it's obvious the bus driver has been drinking. Basically, it keeps us form reaching our true potential for coolness.
One of the best lessons that I have learned at Duke had to do with self-consciousness and it came from a truly great professor named Jay O'Berski, or as he prefers to be called, "Uncle Jay Bird."
I was lucky enough to take "Intro to Performance" with Uncle Jay Bird my freshman year. For those of you who are not familiar with Theater Studies 99S, the course involves a lot of sitting in circles and a big part of your grade is based on your proficiency at musical chairs (I believe it was cross listed as BME).
Anyways, during one of the first few classes we were participating in an activity in which each student was supposed to pretend to be some sort of animal, and then have interactions with the other animals in the class. As we were all hopping and crawling around on the floor, giggling and blushing out of embarrassment, Uncle Jay Bird told us to stop. He then told us something that has stuck with me ever since. He said, "I know you feel like you look really stupid right now, and believe me, you do. But the good news is that everybody else is much too busy worrying about how stupid they look to care in the slightest about you."
Since taking his class, I have found this piece of advice to be extremely valuable. It really is freeing to realize that nobody cares about you. Every time I do something that I think makes me look stupid (believe me, it doesn't happen too often) or am worried about saying something out of fear of sounding dumb, I try to remind myself that everybody else is much too concerned with how they look to care at all about me.
The truth is that embarrassment is simply self-flattery. As you walk around campus some time, try to remember Uncle Jay Bird's advice. You'll start to notice that regardless of how worried you are about being judged, the fact is that we are all generally much too self-involved to worry about what other people are doing.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying that becoming less self conscious will make you as cool as me. I just think that there's a good chance it will make you enjoy yourself a little more, and possibly improve your college experience.
It's hard not to worry about being inadequate these days, especially when there are people like myself out there showing you just how inadequate you actually are, but I think if we make an effort to keep Uncle Jay Bird's advice in mind, we'll all be a lot happier and cooler as a result.
And until everybody is able to become as cool, popular and good looking as me, I will continue to stay modest and try not to focus on my copious attributes. Because when you think about it, if I were to focus on my attributes, I really wouldn't be able to focus on anything else-I just don't have that much focus.
Jake Grodzinsky is a Trinity senior. His column runs every other Wednesday.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.