Undergraduate / "A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies" ; University of Chicago [6]

This is my draft for the prompt below. I'm not sure if it fits right. And I haven't come up with a closing so I'd like some feedback on how it's going so far. Be as critical as possible! Thanks! :3 Oh, and what sort of personality does it convey?

"A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies." -Oscar Wilde.

Othello and Iago. Dorothy and the Wicked Witch. Autobots and Decepticons. History and art are full of heroes and their enemies. Tell us about the relationship between you and your arch-nemesis (either real or imagined).

It is a very suffocating feeling. One distinctively similar to drowning. You try to scream, you try hard, but alas you cannot. You are drowning in everything. All the anger and frustration and hurt. Your mind, invaded by a whirlwind of impatient thoughts whispering, murmring, some even screaming to be heard - yet it is so peaceful. So peaceful you start to doubt your sanity. It haunts me every second of every day, always there in the back of my mind, like a vulture waiting for my demise. I cannot run from it. It is a part of me. It is my downfall. My antagonist. My arch-nemesis. The fear of rejection.

I started preparing for my undergraduate application on the 11th of November 2012. Driven by determination, I began planning every step I would take to ensure my application would reach it's full potential. Paying ridiculous amounts of attention to the simplest and most redundant of details. CommonApp, essays and interviews - simple stuff. I was gonna rock this thing.

Today, it is the 9th of December 2012. Oh, how wrong I was. I definitely have not 'rocked this thing' . This journey from the day I started, this nerve-wracking, hair-pulling, wholly intense journey was not the walk in the park I expected. The problem didn't lie in forms or the essays ( well the essays played a fair part in it but it isn't the problem! ) . No. The problem was in me.

My relationship with my parents has always been a turbulent one. Our conversational topics, limited to academics, skepticism and basic small talk. How is this related to the problem I faced? Well, remember earlier on in the paragraph before when I described this hell of a journey with all those ? I meant it. So much that if this were written on paper, it would bleed out real blood and sweat and tears imbued with an inferno of my rage and frustration (Clearly an exaggeration but I think you get the point). Everytime my father talked to me and it would almost always be about the application, sooner or later I would break out in tears at this one thought. Just one thought brought me down; held down by the ropes of a low self esteem and enslaved by the very realistic possibility and idea that I wasn't good enough. Skeptical little me, after reviewing the facts, gave into the worst possible scenario - rejection.

I was a mess. The fear plagued me and poked at my insecurities and weaknesses. In all my days, never have I encountered an opponent or obstacle so simple yet so complex. It is a part of me and I know it so well yet I still fell prey to it.

Today it is different. I no longer stumble over weak excuses and paranoia of the next time I'm faced with that one thought. Today I've realised how strong my desires are. The reassuring strength in the desire to accomplish a long term goal. It trumps anything anyday. It's not the time and effort that I've put into it but my faith and hope. And that gets me through the unkind days and seemingly towering obstacles.

The fear of rejection, however, is a tricky little thing. It manifests itself in different forms and situations. Though I have won this battle, there will be more to come before the war is finally won. It is an ongoing internal conflict between my fear of rejection and my desire to fulfill my life goal.