Undergraduate / Hard-working, analytical, intellectual - Application essay from an international student. [5]

I will be applying to universities this year and I'm currently working on my personal profile. It would be of huge help if I could get some feedback on this one.

Tell us about who you are.

How would your family, friends, and/or members of your community describe you? If possible, please include something about yourself that you are most proud of and why. (maximum 250 words)

In an academic level, I am mostly described by others as a hard-working, analytical, intellectual, and helping person. On the other hand, and on a more personal level, they would say I am happy, optimistic, loving, understanding, and successful. I like to think those traits apply to me, but I also want to emphasize that they did not come embedded in me and that I actually had to work hard for them. Like everyone, I have been through troubling times. I will go on ahead and elaborate on what I just said by talking about what I am most proud of.

I could easily start talking about my academic and extracurricular achievements, but I would just be lying to myself. In reality, what makes me proudest started when I was suffering from severe anxiety; I was always comparing myself to others and looking for ways in which I could be better than them. This was my biggest mistake. It turns out that by constantly looking towards others to justify my self-worth, I was just jeopardizing my self-esteem. What makes me the proudest about myself is that I was able to realize and understand this, and I made changes to my way of thinking that made me who I am today: I started competing against myself, seeing others as support and not adversaries, and for the first time I started believing in my own potential. There's still much to be done, but I'm proud of what I have achieved so far.