Discovering Chelsea
Walking through life open-handed.
Chelsea Coplestone always speaks with her hands open. Today is not an exception.
Our starting conversation includes a quick discussion about Chelsea’s favourite car brand (Tesla), how great it is to reach 21, and Chelsea’s recently ignited obsession with K-Pop band, BTS. As we talk, her hands move from side-to-side, palms out, fingers an easy distance apart from each other.
Every gesture is relaxed, just like Chelsea herself. Soon, I find myself relaxing too.
The room feels wider. The grey drizzle outside doesn’t matter as much as it did a minute ago. We are both having fun.
This is the Chelsea effect. It’s an opening of space, and a brightening of atmosphere that comes with Chelsea being herself.
How does Chelsea keep walking through life open-handed? Over the rest of the interview, I got a few answers.
Chelsea literally puts others before herself.
The highlights of our chat:
If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future or anything else, what would you want to know?
I’d want to know about my future, and the one thing I’d want to know is: Am I still happy, and working towards my goals? You just never know where life is going to take you. So I’d want to make sure that I still have a goal, and I’m still working towards it. I wouldn’t want to be stagnant.
Is there something you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it yet?
I’d like to travel and live in another country. I’ve put that off because of uni, and to get a job. So it’s definitely something I want to do but I just don’t have the funds or the experience to travel right now. I think that when it does happen I will enjoy it more, because I’ve had to wait for it. I feel like if I went when I had just finished school it would have been a whole different experience. Even if I go next year, it will be a different experience than if I had gone this year.
What is your most treasured memory?
That’s a really hard one. I don’t think I have a singular memory but my parents took me on a big trip when I was 12 and that whole trip is my most treasured memory. We went to America, then England, Wales, Europe, and we stopped over in Hong Kong on the way back. It took two months. I learnt so much then at such a young age about the world, and different people. Also, my first year of uni. It’s not really a “treasured” memory because it wasn’t the best. Still I learnt a lot and that was what I liked about it, I learnt a lot.
What is one problem in the world you’d like to fix and how do you think we could fix it?
We need world peace. You don’t have to like someone to be nice to them. I think if we’re more understanding of people, and tolerant of people, then the world would be a better place. Just get along everybody. Come on, if five-year-olds can do this at school then we can too.
Chelsea in the act of educating me about the music of BTS.
Chelsea’s dream in progress:
Chelsea has always enjoyed working with children. So it’s not surprising that she uses the social skills of five-year-olds to discuss models of world peace.
When she was 16, Chelsea took her love for working with young people, and turned it into a career plan. She decided to study Education. Five years later, Chelsea’s dream of becoming a primary teacher hasn’t changed. However, it is more specific.
Chelsea’s ideal teacher-self is a safe haven for every little human who walks into her classroom. Her goal is to create a learning environment where kids can feel comfortable being themselves.
2020 is a springboard in Chelsea’s own learning journey. By December, she will have won her degree in primary teaching, and Aotearoa will gain an open-minded, and more imporantly open-hearted, young teacher.