Personal Narrative: Soar To Success

Imagine being at the peak of your high school career, personally, academically, and athletically. For me, that was my sophomore year. I was selected to be on the homecoming court, I won a free class ring, and a free corsage and boutonniere for prom. I was on my way to a 4.0 grade point average. I was pulled up to Varsity basketball, I became the 100 meter hurdle regional champion, and I qualified for two events at the Division 4 State meet for track and field. In one split second, a clip of a hurdle, that was over. My first race of the day was the preliminary 100 meter hurdles. Once the race started, I was calm, focused, and determined. I was starting to make my way up to the front of the pack when I clipped my trail leg on the eighth hurdle.

“It goes upside down!” I said. My sister was telling me about a roller coaster ride in Disney World after our parents had broken the news that we were going the summer of my fourth grade year. The idea of going to a park was amazing, but the terrifying part was my slight fear of the fast roller coasters that my family enjoys. My parents looked at me, and I smiled with uncertainty. But on the contrary I started to feel a faint feeling of ambition because maybe I could overcome my fear.

There I was on the block next to the High Bar. It was about 5:00 at night when my coach told me to do a Kip. As I got up on the bar my nose filled with the smell of chalk. I started to swing, and as I came out of my half turn I looked good. Everything seemed fine but as I came to the part of the Kip where I have to pull my legs up to the bar, I slammed my shins into the bar. My momentum was stopped and I dropped on to the mat, missing the Kip. I felt like I had let down my coach and I had let down myself too. That day I experienced failure. That failure made me want my Kip even more so I worked harder and had support from my teammates.

I’ve always asked myself,” what does it really take to make it big? To play amongst the greats, how could I do that? Me, Skylar Ross, a young man with this desire, the passion, wanting to play side by side with legends, to become someone people talk about, is what has pushed me all these years. It drove me to become a better player, to become more informed about the sport. This also influenced me to become more intertwined with school, that way I could have a better chance at getting a scholarship at a college.

It was a typical Sunday morning, I ate breakfast with my family and got ready for church. The morning went on with a drag, than 5 o’clock hit. Once 5 o’clock hit my mother started yelling at my sister and me to get our stuff packed and into the car. We had only a few hours before my final summer of upward bound started. Since I started my senior year I’d been remembering many moments of my past and been reflecting on them. Therefore as I began to pack, it didn’t seem strange to me as I started to flash back to what had gotten me into Upward Bound in the first place.

According to their BMI chart I was considered obese at two hundred and twenty pounds of solid muscle. I was told to drop down to one hundred and eighty pounds. The worst part about it was that I had just three months. I worked hard at the gym, three times a day, seven days a week. While going though this challenged I became homeless. I could not let this stop me because I knew it was all temporary. It took me just about a month and half to drop about forty pounds. It was probably the second hardest thing I ever had to do. When I dropped the weight, I was able to move to Massachusetts with family and keep up the recruitment process in NYC. It was not an easy thing to do, constant mailing, scanning, phone calls, and some traveling back and forth just to complete it all. Finally after a year of the first ever initial call I was being shipped to boot camp in

Reading was the new outlet for my imagination and the stories I read fascinated me. They weren’t too unlike the scripts of computer games or the own stories I came up with on my own, but books actually had the action and emotional aspects written out. And again, while my peers were reading things about growing up, things that had morals and would teach valuable lessons (I remember one book about a shoplifter who had to do community service at an animal shelter), I read real fiction: Jurassic Park, Dragonriders of Pern, Lord of the Rings… Stuff of fantasy and science-fiction that let my mind stray from reality. Stuff that kept my imagination alive while I was being forced to learn multiplication and the names of countries. Of course, my teachers encouraged me to keep reading, as long as I wasn’t doing the reading in the middle of their lectures. But it wasn’t because of their influence, however, that kept me interested in books. It was because I loved it. It put pictures into my head and made me think. So I kept reading. But even then I knew reading wasn’t enough… Yes, the stories were fascinating, but they weren’t what I wanted. Back then I wasn’t sure what I wanted, but as middle school came to a close, I found it.

2017 Women in Leadership Conference has opened my eyes and my heart to a wonderful world of opportunities. These successful and inspirational speakers; Dr. Wendy Murphy and Bentina Terry, along with the list of phenomenal of panelist really stood out with ear piercing words like be myself and be confident in what I know. Having mentors would be one key to my success that I learned and can begin today. Mentors provide support, motivation, understanding, and guidance. The one last thing to drive it home was Bentina Terry outstanding and unforgettable lecture. I will never forget her words of Boundless instead, of fearless, who’s going to stop me, and never jump if I don’t have wings. The needed learning tools given in this

We all know reading is boring, time consuming, and compulsory. All though, most kids would agree with that statement, some may disagree. Some can say that if one does not read they can lose knowledge and become less smart. If you don't read there can be consequences for stopping. Reading is valuable because it gives readers the power to escape, to maximize their potential, and to strengthen their mind.

The lessons that we take from failure can be fundamental to later success. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn from the experience?

Beyond your child's physical and sensory development, the brain, likewise, needs to be stimulated and kept in shape. Studies have shown time and again that people who are read to as children tend to do better in school and in their careers. Children's books and regular reading sessions can make the difference between a child who enjoys the challenge of schoolwork and a child who finds schoolwork to be a

Lessons Learned from FailureIn the summer before my freshman year of high school, a couple of my friends and I wereout late at night inside our neighborhood. I could remember it was a cold night, for Florida atleast, and it was windy as well. We were out later than we were supposed to be, yet we were verytired and did not want to run all the way to the other side of the neighborhood. So, we asked arandom kid who drove by if he could drive us to our friend’s house and he said he could. Whilewe were on the way to the house, the kid began to drive very fast. Before we knew it, we hadcrashed into a wall that surrounded the neighborhood. The accident was a lesson given to me so Iwould be able to prevent myself and others from future failure.The hospital was very quiet and there was not much going on besides them attending toour needs.

Reading is something that is taught to everyone in their early childhood, the time I learned to read I was very fond of books. I loved to read novels to myself and to read them out loud to my sister. I like reading action, thriller, historical fiction, and mystery. During my early childhood we would have challenges of reading such as wrapped up and reading, golden dragon. These were reading challenges for students to read 20-25 specific grade novels during the school year and at the end you got a party if you read at least 5-10. I used to love reading and at that time I would read at least 20 books because I wanted to go to the party and win something with the lottery tickets I got. My childhood was fulI of reading, even if I read because I was greedy and I read because of the party, it still improved my reading level. As I grew and grew my reading

In my 38 years of life, I’ve had to overcome plenty of obstacles. When examining my life, especially in my younger years, it showed me life consists of an assortment of minor and major obstacles. Facing an obstacle, especially a major one, and conquering it, awards me a triumphant feeling. Furthermore, this feeling did provide me with determination, willpower, and courage to take on any future obstacles that life can throw at me (Harrington, 2012). This makes minor obstacles to become like a cake walk.

As a child, my interests were more focused on reading than writing. In elementary school I fell in love with books. Initially I read simple children’s books, much like everybody else in my class, but it did not take long for my passion to drive me to read more difficult writings. Fiction books quickly became a replacement for any childhood toys. Instead of blocks or stuffed animals I would ask my parents for books. Since they were aimed at young readers, they tended to be short. I found myself going through them within days, and then soon several hours. Towards the end of elementary school I was reading series like Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. I was captivated, and reading truly opened up a whole new world for me.