“Boredom is a gift.” Miranda Jatib on what inspires her to try everything

By: Anthony Payne

June 14, 2026

A master of self-study, 19 year-old Miranda Jatib is never not learning. A native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, after high school she moved to Boston to study philosophy and economics, while simultaneously pursuing computer science and film production. Miranda produced standout segments for On Our Minds: Election 2024 and this year’s On Our Minds: Road Trip. She recently transferred to New York University to immerse herself more deeply in the world of production. In this Q&A, she shares what got her into storytelling and offers insight into what makes her such a self-starter and  keeps her inspired in every direction.

This Q&A has been lightly edited for clarity.

 

How did you first get involved with media and visual storytelling?

My sophomore year I didn’t have any slots left in my classes so I had to take a film class and I ended up falling in love with it. And I am an avid movie theatergoer. I’ve made a couple of my own little short films, and I’m trying to get a little more seriously into that. And more or less around that time, a peer of mine was like, “Hey, you’re outgoing. I’m not as outgoing. I could use a hand if you could help me with this school radio show.” It was a daily morning news show and it was all improvised as well, which definitely developed my public speaking skills and I really enjoyed it. And then from there, my teacher got an email from Nico Fisher asking if she knew anybody who could participate as a part of this special Puerto Rico episode for On Our Minds: Election 2024. So she recommended me.

What interested you in telling a story about Calle Loíza for On Our Minds?

Technically Calle Loíza isn’t my hometown, but it’s where my dad grew up. It’s where my grandpa first immigrated. My brother lives there right now. And my dad had his first business there. My mom had her first business there. And so I definitely did feel a very special connection to that street, and I feel like it’s also one of the streets where I first started noticing the arts coming back into the forefront in Puerto Rico. Everyone’s so indie. You see their style. Everybody’s vibe is so inspiring. But I also wanted to recognize that this came with some downsides, there’s been very heavy gentrification, and so I wanted to explore it kind of for my sake as well. I wanted a project that would force me to learn about this more. How drastic are the downsides, how are people in the community truly reacting, do they think it’s positive, negative?

I got overly ambitious with it and I would have liked to have been able to narrow the story down more from the start. And I’m very grateful to the SRL team for being able to help me make those hard decisions of what needs to go and what needs to stay. 

How do you get over a fear of talking with people for interviews? Is that something that you ever struggle with? 

I feel like I am kind of naturally outgoing. We also have a saying, ‘the most introverted Puerto Rican is still pretty extroverted by average standards.’ So I feel like being from there, it’s definitely pretty easy to approach people. People are generally friendly and they won’t turn away. Maybe they’ll say mean things behind your back but never to your face, you know. 

I’ve been rejected a couple times, that definitely does tarnish your morale a bit, but you always do have that reporter cap that you put on where it’s like, ‘oh, it’s not me. I’m doing this for professional inquiries.’ That definitely makes it even easier to approach people when you’ve had a bad couple of runs.

Why philosophy?

It all started because I wasn’t raised religious. My mom tried to raise my brother Catholic, and at the catechism classes they would give him after school, they wouldn’t give him food until the classes were over. My brother was a very skinny, frail kid, and so one day he came to my mom’s car and he threw up. And my mom was like, ‘Okay, that’s enough, we’re not taking you back!’ And it just kind of shook her to her core And so, they decided with me, they would just kind of let me do whatever I wanted. 

And I never really did lean too heavy into religion, but I was a big reader. During the pandemic I had plenty of time to research and I started learning about absurdism and then Sartre and then existentialism and so on and so forth. I think I like that it’s very subjective, but there’s also cases to be made for every position. I also really like the logic part of philosophy. 

 

What are your goals for the future?

I feel like right now I have two paths and I plan on trying out both. I will study philosophy and economics, probably minor in comp-sci and film production. And I’ll try to see either in LA or New York how I can pursue film production, how I can get myself onto sets while also in the back of my mind prepping for a potential law school. And I’m not even 100% sure if I want to be a lawyer, but I feel like being more educated never hurts. And if I have the opportunity, it’s something I should take. Um, and I mentioned before I’m into AI ethics right now. And we’ll see where that takes me.

Who are your role models?

Definitely my brother. He’s eight years older than me so, you know, when we were young he would tease me, he would bother me, he’d kick me out of his room, all that. I feel like when he graduated we reached a meeting point and it became very obvious like ‘Oh god, we’re the same person.’ One of the reasons why I really admire him is he never doubts himself and he tells himself he’s capable of doing anything he sets his mind to. 

He’s always loved cars. And so he went on Facebook Marketplace and he bought the skeleton for a buggy and he didn’t know anything. He started watching YouTube tutorials on how to turn it into a proper buggy with an engine. He learned how to weld from YouTube tutorials. And he would also constantly invite me to the garage and be like, ‘Oh, help me put the brake fluid in, whatever.’ But it was really more about him teaching me how to do this thing that he really loves to do, so I can also become more skillful and more independent. He’d find ways of tricking me to learn how to change my own tire so I wouldn’t have to depend on anyone.

What’s a recent piece of media that’s made an impression on you?

The album LUX by Rosalia. The lyrics are just so beautiful and it’s a lot about how humans are contradictory beings. I do admire her. She was not the best singer to begin with, not the best dancer. She completed the Camino de Santiago at 19 years old with the dream of asking God to be a successful artist, to have a successful music career. And so she started taking these lessons and songwriting and so on and so forth. And I would say she has definitely made it now.

What’s something you’re looking forward to? 

I’m looking forward to this summer. Growing up, I would get so annoyed when my classmates would be like, ‘I hate summer because I have nothing to do and nobody assigning me work.’ I would get so frustrated they couldn’t realize that you can assign yourself work, like this is the point! Do something, come up with something! I am feeling especially excited to come back home, obviously spend time with family, spend time with friends. We’re definitely going to shoot a silly short film. And I want to start teaching myself how to code. I want to set some time apart to be creative in whatever sense that means, whether that means working on another journalistic piece, or writing a screenplay, or I have my guitar sitting right next to me that I haven’t seen since I left for Boston. Boredom is a gift.