"I will not bow I will not break I will shut the world away" - essay for Virginia Tech

Prompt:Discuss a piece of writing, music, film or other creative work that has influenced the person you are today.

Throughout my life I think one of my largest struggles was committing 100 percent to something. Whether it was finishing a project or running the mile in gym class, I always made an excuse why I couldn't finish it. I think my problem was a lack of determination or maybe low self-esteem. It seemed as though it was part of my nature, that everything was just naturally harder for me. Well it was almost as soon as I found the band Breaking Benjamin that I had overcome that natural feeling of hardship. One of the most influential songs by that band for me personally is "I Will Not Bow". The chorus of the song speaks to me the most though "I will not bow I will not break I will shut the world away". What I took from these words is that no matter what is given to me I could overcome it and succeed in life. Because of the inspiration those words gave me I now strive to achieve more than I could think of and accomplish all of my goals.

Very good! Great ideas, here..
Now, I see one glaring area of possible improvement: At the start of the essay you say that you have always had trouble committing 100% to something. I do not believe this is true. I think you are trying to find a way to express the idea you got from the song, but inadvertently you are presenting yourself as someone who does not have strong convictions. Instead of saying you struggled to commit to something, say that you have been constantly trying to refine your focus and trying to apply 100% of yourself to actualize your ideal effort. Your ideal effort is to give all of yourself, just like Jack Kerouac says: You want to burn, burn, burn, giving all of yourself like spectacular roman candle fireworks exploding like a spiderweb across the sky.

Sounds great! I really like it! However it is a bit unnecessary to use "I think" in your response.