Undergraduate /
'only who I am' - common app essay "WHO I AM" [23]
THIS IS THE FIRST DRAFT OF MY ANOTHER ESSAY FOR COMMON, WHICH ONE IS BETTER?
THX A LOT!
Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.(500 words limited)
The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep. And miles to go before I sleep.
Robert Frost
"You can't change the world because you are nothing but ordinary." Every time I looked into the mirror of my sixteen, these words hit me, like light reflected from the mirror, inevitable and invisible but still wounding. When I talked about my dreams, becoming influential and changing the world, people always sniffed and sneered. My dreams, like seeds planted in my deep heart, tried to grow without sunlight, but they couldn't. The way to the future became tougher as more taunts and pressures punched me. I started to consider words of others and be hesitant about my dreams. However, I could hear a voice inside of me, screaming that I should at least make an attempt. I felt like I was lost in a dark world, complicated as a labyrinth. I don't know what to do or where I'm heading for. The only thing I could do is to break the world, which was built around me.
A door opened to me when I joined a long-distance hiking camp. People around believed that with my physical ability, I couldn't finish this miserable long hiking. However, I just wanted to run away from my world.
When I made every step during the hiking, which became harder as time flew by, the feeling of lost attacked me again, nibbling my determination. However, I insisted till the end because I reminded a story my mother told me, that a spider could still make webs on the wall though it couldn't fly because of its diligence and persistence.
When we achieved at our terminal point, a mountain spring, a friend asked me, "Why you come to this hiking?"
"Maybe to escape." I whispered, telling her my confusions about my dreams.
"I cannot believe there is a spring in such a deep mountain area. " She said, looking at the spring, "Did you get over it?"
I said with no hesitation. "All of us didn't believe I can fulfill this hiking. However, finally I made it because I woke up my potential. Whether I could successfully do something depends on whether I can believe in myself, make choices and always hold on rather than how many people believe I can. Just like this spring, no matter how many people believe it could exist here, it still breaks out from the arid soil."
I know I find my way and later in my life, I always remember that I'm the spring. I always believe in myself, no matter how others consider my dreams impossible; I never give up though I grow up in an ordinary place. I always keep holding on, because I know that miracles could happen only if I try,
The seeds of dreams eventually grow up on my way of pursuing tomorrow. I won't go sleep because I have miles to go, have dreams that I need to keep holding on.
