Japanese kid stuns Internet with awesome, rock star-like response to journal-writing assignment

When asked to look back on his week, this kid got full marks for cool bravado, but probably only partial credit for the assignment.

As we get older, most of us develop the belief that mulling over our actions with the benefit of hindsight helps us to evaluate our life decisions, and that the insights gained allow us to make better future choices and grow as individuals. However, that concept can be a difficult thing to instill in a young mind, because kids’ natural curiosity and energy tends to make them focus on the here and now.

One common technique used by educators is to have students write in a journal, since the process of putting words down on paper requires a certain amount of self-reflection. Japanese Twitter user @momoharurin’s son seems to have been assigned such a task, bringing home a worksheet with the writing prompt “Look back on what you did this week.” However, this attempt to nurture the boy’s young mind hit a snag when it ran into his burning heart.

息子の日記がロックだった件 https://t.co/BAaRhEbhRZ

—
マギー (@momoharurin) May 22, 2017

Instead of following the directions, @momoharurin’s son wrote:

“I won’t look back. The only thing I’ll do is keep moving forward.”

Ordinarily, harmonious and studious Japan doesn’t approve of acts of disobedience. However, even @momoharurin couldn’t deny the dramatic awesomeness of the boy’s declaration, tweeting “My son’s journal is like something out of a rock song.”

Online reactions included:

“What a great, positive-minded kid.”
“They can’t stop you!”
“Too cool.”
“I remember feeling like that, long ago…”

As the last comment alludes to, adhering to this hot-blooded philosophy is easier said than done. However, other commenters pointed out that @momoharurin’s son is already making good on his promise. The Japanese word for “move forward,” susumu, is supposed to be written as 進む, with one kanji character followed by one phonetic hiragana, However, the boy instead wrote it as 進すむ, with two trailing hiragana, which would be read sususumu (which means nothing). But did he go back to erase his mistake and rewrite the word? No, he left it there, as a symbol of the ideology by which he wants to live his life.

Either that, or he just needs to pay more attention in school.

Source: Twitter/@momoharurin

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