College Admissions Essay: The Last 7 Years Of My Life

I have worked hard for many years to get where I am today. I have made the honor roll all four years of high school, am a member of the National Honor Society, and have done much volunteer work as well as participated in extracurricular activities. I will be a first generation college student, and as such, I will be the first in my family with the means and the will to attend an institution of higher learning. I am very excited to have the opportunity to be successful in my life. My family looks upon my accomplishments with pride, as do I.

It was the year 2008, I had just graduated from St. Michael’s School located in Los Angeles, CA. This year was quite exhilarating for me also scary because I was going to attend an all-girls high school. Los Angeles was my birth place also a place where I called home. One day, I came home to hearing my parents talking about moving to Mississippi. I remained devastated, not only we were moving to the south, I’m moving away from childhood friends. I was worried I wouldn’t see them again and I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to make new friends in Mississippi.

As I sit on my bed weakened and dying I want to say that I despair the fall. I have hated this miserable time of the year ever since I was growing up. It reminded me of death and I would have never thought it would actually bring me to the end of my life. I will recount what happened,but I want to re-emphasize that no matter if I go to heaven or hell, I hope to God that I will not see those leaves falling off the town’s beautiful trees, the snow endlessly falling, and the dread of loneliness that this season brings.

I realized how proud my family would be, my future would be better, and the experiences I would be missing out on. Coming from a family of immigrants, I am the first person to graduate have had graduated high school. Naturally my parents were proud. Not having had made up my mind about school, I was still unsure on which route I was headed down. Then my mom started telling all her friends how I just graduate and how I will be going to college and will become this amazing nurse.

Two years later I received the "Presidents Awards for Educational Excellence." With this new experience in hand I moved into high school where I was an honor roll student and where I decided on my career. I took a pharmacy internship position at Walgreen's that was provided by my school and I loved it.

At the age of 39, I decided to return to school and finish my undergraduate degree. Being a single mother I wanted my kids to see how hard work and dedication can really pay off if you commit yourself and push through any adversities, you will win. I received my degree in Healthcare Management and I have been working in health insurance for over fifteen years. Working with people and helping others is my passion. I love to see a smiling happy face.

My life hasn’t always been the easiest. In fact, I have gone through a lot for a typically high school student. Most of the things I went through, a lot of people haven’t. Yet, nobody is perfect right? In those four years, you may learn scholarly wise, but you also learn to grow up real quick. These four years in high school really made me think about the person I used to be, who I am today and who I want to be in the future. Your high school years really are the most important years of your life.

“Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it. For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay”. Habakkuk 2:10 NKJV Bible

During the latter part of my 15-year career, the Lord blessed me with opportunities to grow in my leadership and public speaking skills. I managed a staff of seven, a budget of several million dollars and made presentations to professional boards and potential business partners. After the Lord called me to be home with my children full time, I struggled with the meaning and usefulness of the opportunities I had been blessed to experience. They felt wasted in light of the carpool driving, diaper changing and house cleaning duties that were now the staples of my new “career” at home. After a semester in my church’s MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group, I was asked to co-lead the steering team. This invitation was definitely from the Lord, as I

“Volunteers are the only human beings on the face of the earth who reflect this nation's compassion, unselfish caring, patience, and just plain loving one another.”

Looking back at the years that I have completed in high school is a funny but a true life changer. If I was to go back to one year of high school I would want to go back to freshman year. One reason why I would want to go back to freshman year is to talk to myself. Another reason I would want to go back it tell myself to listen more. The last reason would to see if I could improve myself in any way.

I am an awkward, nerdy self-proclaimed non-conformist who lives behind a pair of horn-rimmed glasses. You can find me sporting distressed denim, earth tone tank tops and my beat up Converse All-Stars. I capture life’s fleeting moments with my sunflower yellow Polaroid camera. I am a lover of laughter and a purveyor of puns. The smallest things bring tears to my eyes; I am not afraid to show my emotions through my obvious facial expressions. My height is five feet two inches; my shoe size is 7; my green eyes are outlined with an amber circle; my hair is brown and wavy. I look up to everything and down at nothing. I write with my right hand but draw better with my left. My life is a tangled, extensive web of emotions

As a seventeen-year-old high school student, a lot of pressure is being placed on my shoulders to decide upon my future plans and goals. All these decisions that are going to shape the rest of my life looming closer by the day, both an exciting and altogether terrifying prospect. Everyone seems to have an idea of how my life should play out; society says finish high school, go to college or university, enter the workforce, purchase a house, and have two point five children. Our society wants us to conform, to follow the typical path in life and contribute to the country collectively. My parents, on the other hand, want my happiness, but they would also like for me to do well in life, a tricky combination. Job titles like doctor, lawyer and politician are thrown around constantly in conversations regarding where I am headed, as if saying these things repeatedly will somehow make them a reality. Myself, I’m just focused on graduating high school, the idea that soon my life will be changing so drastically still hasn’t really sunk in yet. The truth is, I don’t know where I’m going thus far, which makes this essay a good start in figuring that out.

Every person on the planet Earth has been through hardships in one form or another, whether it be financial or personal. However, it is the way an individual handles these hardships that sets them apart: those who succeed, and those who fail. In my life, I have been through financial and personal hardships and have found that both hardships have left me as a stronger, more motivated person. My perseverance during times of adversity has made me a more driven individual, ready to face any challenge the world has to throw at me. Growing up, I was the kid who had it all.

Every day, every one, in the world goes through a challenge, big or small. They affect and impact us significantly. They change the way we think, love, act, and approach or do things. Challenges either frighten or motivate us, but they are what make us the person we are today.