How The Breakfast Club Explains the Common Mistake We Make With Fear

Yes, that Breakfast Club.

The Breakfast Club Kids

Every high school has a clique of kids who sit at the back of the auditorium during an assembly, or in the back of the classroom, whispering among themselves. They are the “The Breakfast Club” Kids. (If you don’t get that reference, you need to watch the movie.)

The Breakfast Club Kids — let’s nickname them BreCKs — act like they don’t want to be noticed, that they are too cool for school. In truth, they crave the attention. Their whispers are just loud enough to turn heads from the other students. Their behavioral tics are conspicuous, designed to attract attention.

Energy Follows Energy

Everyone — both teacher and the other students — is at least partially distracted by them. Even if we cannot hear their whispers or see their body language — slouched down in their chairs, rolling their eyes, their facial expressions — we feel it. Energy is contagious.

Sitting in the back of the room, the BreCKs create disruption. They pull the energy to the back and distract the focus from the main lesson. Classroom time becomes all about them. This is their goal; it is a subconscious yearning for attention.