Undergraduate / "the definition of a workaholic" - Yale Supplemental Essay Advice [7]

What's funny is I know exactly how you're feeling, because I am in the same situation - almost word for word, in fact (except this part: "Within last month I've lost a great deal of hair"). I see what you're trying to do, mostly because I've considered doing it. I see the way you're trying to portray yourself, and I would recommend you steer away from it for a few reasons.

First of all, the activities that you list are all likely in the common app already, and you have ample opportunity to discuss them there. Additionally, the last thing you want to come across as is a trainwreck, even if thats how you (or I) feel. You start to mention the part about wanting to change and making some of those changes towards the end of the essay - but only very briefly. I'd recommend you refocus your essay to speak about the values of balance in your schedule, and reference how at "one point" you felt overwhelmed.

Being a workoholic isn't typically a good thing, either. Like Benn said, schools like Yale don't want a work addict who self-imploded in high school. They want someone who can throw on a heavy course load but manage their social life and other responsibilities as well. I might also either strike or reword the bit about dwelling on a bad grade for weeks. I think one of the most important things in life, and a quality colleges look for, is to see things in perspective. A bad grade is a bad grade, but life moves on, and dwelling on it doesn't help much. You could reword that to say when "I receive a bad grade, I am all the more motivated to challenge and improve myself," but the dwelling part probably shouldn't find its way in there.

Good luck with your essays, and lighten your load a little bit. I am - I'm quitting my job soon and the thought of it feels fantastic.

Undergraduate / Doubt and Consequence: Common Application Essay - Another prompt of your choosing [7]

Never stop persuing your passion for writing; it would be an insult to the world. This was one of the most fluid and colorful pieces I've ever read from someone our age. Your descriptiveness and ease with words is remarkable, and any admissions officer would be a fool to miss that.

The only criticism and suggestion I can offer is to make it more concise. While it was a great read and your writing and word choice are masterful, I felt like it was saying some of the same things over and over again. It's a dramatic piece, no doubt, but I feel like the amount of description and personification you offer doubt borders on the melodramatic. It's phenomenally written, but its just a little too much, and I would cut back on it.

Otherwise, well done sir.

Undergraduate / Doubt and Consequence: Common Application Essay - Another prompt of your choosing [7]

In terms of what to cut, I'd say this paragraph, or at least half of it, could be the first to go. Your essay is about writing, but here you go off on a tangent about debate. If you desperately want to keep it, then I'd say keep only the first and second sentences. The third sentence confused me the first time I read it, and while after a few rereads it makes sense, I don't think it really adds anything to your essay. It's one of those almost melodramatic elements that mainly add length to the piece.


Another example, I think, of the purely dramatic.


Can't decide whether it's grammatically correct to say read or reads in that case...


Also largely sentimental. Creative, yes. But an admissions officer who already read hundreds of essays may be thinking "Get on with it, already."


You say "he" here, as well as in your first paragraph. But in the first few sentences of this paragraph, you use "it."


I might rearrange this sentence to better transition from the negativity of doubt in the first half of your essay, to the positive in the next. "Doubt is what drives me to sadness, doubt is what drives me to every failure and moment of weakness, but, nevertheless, doubt is what drives me to work, and, most of all, doubt is what drives me to every success."


You're not really contradicting your point in the previous paragraph, so "however" doesn't really fit here, I think. I would write Doubt, therefore, gives rise...


I'm not sure what you mean by who you could become. Who CAN you become? Did I miss it or did you not explain it?

Here is a version of your essay with most (if not all) of my comments and suggestions added. Its down to 770 words from 1005, and I think still has most of the meaning the first draft did. By the way, after spending so much time reading this, I think there might be one way to make your essay better. You're dealing largely with the intangible, a concept that affects your life. It MIGHT be worth grounding it with a specific event or experience. For instance, a moment where you overcame doubt, and found the success you spoke of. Where and how you would place that in, I couldn't say. You'd probably need to take a lot of the dramatic stuff out, even what I left, and reorganize/rewrite a good portion of it. Whether that's worth it, you be the judge.

There is nothing in this world as internally exhausting as doubt of oneself.
My experience with doubt cannot be easily grouped into one story or memory, for I've skirmished with it many times over the years, each of us taking to our trenches and trading shots until, inevitably, I drive him away from the mental battleground for a few weeks. But he returns. Usually in the wake of an essay I didn't do well on or an inability to put words down on a page at home. These are small occurrences, and the practical and reasonable part of me calls out, saying that I shouldn't despair, but the deeper emotional part is plagued by the horrible: doubt.

I feel a doubt that I can't write, a doubt that everything that I put onto paper is puerile prose as a vehicle for wholly adolescent ideas. It is the doubt that a talent I once had, a talent I've always been told I had, has faded; that somehow I have atrophied and like a body-builder awakening from a coma, I can no longer wield the tools that once defined me.

The thought of plateauing permanently at the age of 17 is as appalling to an aspiring author as paralysis is to a star athlete.
The only real way to put these doubts to rest is to write a piece of fiction or an essay good-enough that either my instructors or the small community that reads my work gives positive feedback. Writers are that way, and I have absolutely no shame in saying that as far as my work goes, I am a creature who is a slave to pride and vanity. However, even these moments of brief peace are not totally free of doubt, as somewhere, deep within my brain I hear distant echoes of, "they're just saying that! They don't want to hurt your feelings." Or, "these people don't read you seriously enough to give you real feedback, they picked out some words they liked skimming it, that's your feedback."

Even now, as I write and I see words scuttle onto the screen in front of me like inky spiders, I feel doubt lurking. I feel it waiting for every misplaced comma and overwrought metaphor, for every overly self-pitying phrase and every pathetic clause. I feel it pacing up and down the lanes of my essays, carelessly evaluating and tossing phrases agonizingly crafted aside as he laughs at the feeble attempts of a boy playing at being a man.

Doubt is what drives me to sadness, doubt is what drives me to every failure and moment of weakness, but, nevertheless, doubt is what drives me to work, and, most of all, doubt is what drives me to every success.

The only thing that truly maintains talent is fear of losing it; arrogance and hubris are curses which will rob a runner of his speed, a politician of his charm, or a writer of his pen.

Doubt, therefore, gives rise to the steely human resolve to write and try, resolve which can only exist and have meaning in the face of doubt. Resolve which arises with its knightly aura only after the voice in my head repeatedly tells me that I can't, that I'm not good enough. A rebellious streak offers me an armored hand and a stern look, "you can."

And I cannot disappoint.
Rising above every petty and scared desire, combating and conquering every impulsive urge to give up, this is what makes writing worth it. It is the feeling of triumph and resolve over all our baggage, all our personal monsters and skeletons in our closet. It is the closest I can get to facing pure fear, the closest I can get to staring into the abyss and emerging with my heart and ideas intact. Doubt exists for me to conquer, every silenced insult, every firmly punctuated sentence and every pride-filled line drives me and defines me. It constantly reinforces who I am and who I want to be, and, most importantly, who I can become if I'm not careful.

Doubt is a monster which lives in our hearts and consumes us, its voracious appetite is the most exhausting thing I can think to face, and yet, I wouldn't trade it for the world. Doubts callous laughter and pitying gaze, its patronizing tone borrowed from every pseudo-intellectual, and its grating constant critique are the integral key to my resolve and drive. Doubt may hurt, but it's what makes me who I am, it allows me to do what I do, and, most of all, it allows me to write.

Undergraduate / "The Value of Opportunity" USC Essay [9]


Pet peeve of mine: that's not the correct use of a semi-colon after "then." You're looking for a colon :.

;)

Undergraduate / IS this intro about Page 87 of your autobiography to strong and risky? [4]

I think the topic you chose is fine, and the description creates a favorable effect - engaging the reader by enticing his/her senses. I also like how you tied in VCU at the end. Perhaps it is a little cliche, but I don't think that ever really hurt anyone.

What I would suggest changing, however, is your sentence structure. Almost every sentence is declarative and begins with I. I wince, I begin, I look, I turn, etc. That's ok to do a couple of times, but after the first few instances it becomes noticeably repetitive. Try using different structures; they don't even have to be drastically rewritten. For example, instead of


try "Turning back to focus on my job, my mind drifts off to my first memory of VCU." This makes it easier to read.

Another thing I might suggest: when you have dialogue, try to make it sound more natural. Right now, the things both you and Carl say seem to come from the script of an 90's private-eye tv show. I think it would sound more realistic if the speech were more casual.

Otherwise, this essay has potential, and isn't too strong or risky. It needs a little work, but could go a long way.

Good luck.