Tamara Sh. (ILE) about rigid schedules

And it was only at university that I realized what had been weighing on me so much in school, despite all my academic achievements.

It was — discipline and strict adherence to a rigid schedule!

As they say, everything is understood through comparison — studying at university was like night and day compared to school. At university, there was freedom! If you wanted, you went to lectures; if not, you didn’t — as long as you got the results. The hardest thing in life for me is following discipline; it’s my curse. Forcing myself into strict timeframes, especially starting something at a set time or arriving somewhere at a precise hour, is a real ordeal for me. I’d rather start a task later and finish it later, but do it with joy and inspiration, than just sit there marking time from bell to bell — especially in the morning, when I’m barely awake.

I believe our society tries to “comb us all with the same comb” and turn us, the irrationals, into rationals. We resist!

<...> Everyone comes to work on time, but I can’t come on time—I’m not like everyone else, I just can’t come to work on time like everyone else. I’m completely different, of a different nature; I mustn't arrive at work on time. And then these managers get all worked up, tracking and writing down when everyone arrives. I think: “Well, why compare me to everyone else?!”