Undergraduate / A LEAP INTO THE UNKNOWN: william and mary essay - diving: taking a risk [2]

Do titles count as part of the 500 word limit?

Prompt: We know that nobody fits neatly into 500 words or less, but you can provide us with some suggestion of the type of person you are. Anything goes! Inspire us, impress us or just make us laugh. Think of this optional opportunity as show and tell by proxy and with an attitude.

A LEAP INTO THE UNKNOWN

When I signed up for my high school's diving team as a freshman, I never expected how much the sport would change me.

During the summer before entering high school, I first fell in love with the feeling of weightlessness I experienced when I flew off the diving board into the air and the adrenaline rush I felt after successfully completing a new dive for the first time. Defying the laws of gravity and flipping more times in midair than I thought was humanly possible only added to my excitement. Before I could continue doing what I loved however, I first had to overcome my fear of being outside of my comfort zone. With uncharacteristic courage, I overlooked my aversion to throwing myself into the unknown and entered the pool, not knowing anyone else there. This single action opened the door to an abundance of new experiences that are now an inseparable piece of my identity, and not once have I regretted my decision.

Diving has enhanced my self-confidence in innumerable ways. Overcoming my initial qualms about trying something new proved that I could face any challenge. Rather than shying away from competition, I now welcome the thrill of performing under pressure. It has been exhilarating to watch myself improve with every year and learn harder dives, and knowing that I am capable of accomplishing any feat with determination, patience, and hard work. Difficult workouts also brought my teammates and I closer together. Belonging to a team allowed me to form relationships with friends I would otherwise have not met.

Diving also requires sacrifices and self-discipline. For the past four years, I have had to wake up at 5:00 a.m. three days a week for morning practice. Only a passion for the sport and a strong commitment to my team could have motivated me, a life-long night owl, to get out of bed everyday. Maintaining excellent grades during the season was another challenge. Completing homework on time required focus and forced me to learn when to ignore distractions. Reevaluating my priorities was necessary for me to succeed in school and diving simultaneously. Diving has taught me the value of willpower; whether I push myself to finish a workout while my coach is not watching or to learn an intimidating new dive, I know the reward will make the pain worthwhile.

As my final high school diving season came to an end this November, I realized that even the best of times must end. I consider joining the diving team one of the most valuable decisions I have made. The lessons I have learned, the memories I have created, and the friends I have met will stay with me forever. Although I will miss the sport next year, I look to the future with optimism and excitement, because I know that there will be many more live-changing opportunities in store for me. As I learned as a freshman, taking a risk opens up a whole new world of possibilities.

Undergraduate / Motivation - Common app essay: learning from a failure [2]

Motivation

In the few seconds before the end of the song, I hurriedly scanned my copy of Chopin's Waltz in E Minor. As the sound of the final note gently faded away, my friend Jessica stood up from the piano bench and triumphantly bowed to the audience - my cue to walk up to the stage. When I reached the shiny black piano, my heart rate escalated to a rapid staccato beat, and I wished that I could feel confident and prepared while I unfolded my first piece. Naturally, I was not rewarded with a sudden stroke of luck. My performance sounds like I have practiced once in the last two weeks. And unfortunately, that was the truth. By the time I struck the last chord, my face burned with embarrassment. For me, these three minutes were enough time to change my perspective on work ethic and motivation.

With the annual piano recital a little over a month away, or as I saw it, a whole month away, I had gradually become immune to my piano teacher's increasingly frequent complaints about how little I practiced. As much as I wanted to do well, I either laughed these criticisms off, insisting that plenty of time to prepare still remained, or felt frustrated and annoyed, believing that it was unrealistic for her to think I could find time to practice at all. After all, I thought, the spring of my junior year in high school had brought a mountain of homework and stress, so piano should have been the last thing on my mind. My teacher and I usually did not see eye-to-eye on the acceptable amount of time to spend seated at the piano. The more I argued that sports and friends filled up my leisure time, the more adamant she became about setting aside time to practice. Wrapped up in my hectic schedule, I focused almost exclusively on short-term goals, like getting an extra hour of sleep before a meet or remembering to tell a story to a friend, and I shoved future events like the piano recital down my list of priorities. Balancing time and effort spent on extracurricular activities had not seemed essential for success - until this disastrous recital.

As I returned to my seat, determinedly avoiding the eyes of my family members and fellow musicians, I caught myself mentally, automatically, tabulating a list of excuses for my bad performance. Startlingly, none of my imagined excuses were even true - I did not go to bed extremely late the night before, and I was not coming down with a cold. I only had myself to blame for months of ignoring the inevitability of playing in the recital. Declaring that I perform best under pressure would no longer be an acceptable form of preparation.

That night, I stared up at my ceiling, trying unsuccessfully to convince myself that all of my mistakes didn't matter. It didn't matter if the relatives of the other students thought I didn't take the recital seriously. Why should I care if my teacher thought I was a bad musician? Everyone in the audience would forget about the recital in a few weeks anyway, wouldn't they? I was wrong - I did care about my performance. However, it was not because of what others thought; what bothered me the most was knowing that I could have done better if I had committed myself to preparing for the recital just as I knew I should. The motivation to succeed came from myself, and I could not be satisfied as long as I knew that I could have done a better job with more effort. The accuracy of the notes represented not my skill as a musician, but proof that I felt passionate enough about music to commit to and complete learning the song. More importantly, I realized that ultimately, I had the greatest influence on my own actions.

With a fresh outlook, I sat down with the waltz once again, determined to improve the piece until it sounded as professional as I could make it. If I made a commitment to an activity, I reasoned, why not complete it to the best of my ability? Even though academics were my first priority, music was still an important part of my life. No longer did want to I settle for mediocre work in any of my endeavors.

Being able to influence my own ability to succeed empowered me. As an added plus, hearing my improved performance, consonant notes, and correct rhythms during my lessons thrilled my teacher. By the end of one lesson, I had successfully played Chopin's waltz from beginning to end with no mistakes. My effort was perceptible; I could hear it in the music. The delighted smile slowly spreading across my face mirrored the satisfaction of fulfilling my self-determined expectations.