Informant: “Every single day at school, our principal would do morning announcements before school started. We’d pray, say the pledge, and sometimes students would be on it, anywho, he would always end with ‘Make it a great day…’ then he would pause ‘or not, the choice is yours.’ He would always say that. We would always laugh about it and make fun of it, but it’s true: it really is your choice. Whether something goes good or bad, it’s how you choose to respond to it that determines the outcome. So, even though we would laugh at it, I can appreciate it now. Another one was “take the hit”. Man, if you think you’re gonna fail a test, don’t try and cheat and make up for the lack of effort; just take the hit. Basically, he’s saying it’s not worth it to try to get out of responsibilities. It’s also not good to get let off when you don’t put in the effort, and I think that point applies to college and work. I can’t go BS some numbers in my construction job. That could cost someone their life. I gotta do it right. So, taking the hit would be showing up late for me. But I would never do something half-minded and do a bad job.

Context:

The informant went to a Christian school where the principal would use this catchphrase at the end of the morning announcements. He and his friends often mocked the phrase and thought it was silly, but later in his life, he now sees the value in it and what the principal was trying to impart. The phrase “take the hit” was also repeated a lot at that school, especially when a teacher or the principal thought you were being suspicious and were likely to do something wrong, like cheat on an assignment, copy a friend’s homework, etc. They would often tell you this and then not do anything to stop you or punish you for whatever they thought you were going to do. Basically, giving you a chance to make the right choice.

Analysis:

I also went to this school, and I think it is pretty clear what the principal was trying to get us to consider. He wants us to be responsible people and understand that taking the easy way out eventually comes back to bite you. Additionally, he wants us to understand that it is completely within our power to control how we react to adversity. Something bad can happen to you, but that doesn’t mean it has to be a bad day. Of course, we would take this to the extreme with jokes like: Student 1: oh man, my dog died. Student 2: The choice is yours. However, as the informant points out, most of us understood that the message was good and have since sought to apply it to our lives, even if we mocked it back then.