Hello guys, I've got an essay that I've written on the topic, A significant challenge that I've overcome. Please could you give me as much feedback as possible, I'd greatly appreciate that. It's a touching essay, but feel free to expose all the areas that need to be improved.
"Nick, are you okay?" I asked him
"Yes, don't worry." He replied, whilst we were walking along a straight path, under the Jacaranda trees, which took us to the boarding houses.
Three days later, Nick passed away.
The day we got chosen as prefects were one of the best days of our lives. It was, simply, a beautiful day. After that, Nick and two other colleagues got picked to be our heads( Headboy, Deputy Headboy, and Senior Prefect) with Nick as our Headboy. We had both achieved our goals and that sense of achievement was overwhelming.
There was a night when I went into Nick's room and we started playing video games( Fifa 2016, NBA 2K16 and Assassin's Creed) on his laptop. It was all going well until he, all of a sudden, threw his controller onto the floor and told me that he wasn't feeling too good. I was shocked. Something was wrong because what he had done was out of character. Anyway, I just left it and moved on. The next day, he had to go for a checkup early in the morning and the medical diagnosis was that he had a chest infection. I went to get him when he came back from the hospital and they had loaded him with medication, but it didn't seem that serious. As we walked back to the hostel area, I asked him if he was alright and he responded confidently with a colorful smile, "why wouldn't I be." Unfortunately, I took those words in and didn't pay attention to the brevity of the situation. A few days later, he was rushed to the hospital and that's where he left us. My friend was gone. Our Headboy was gone. I was broken.
The next few weeks were the worst. Each day was filled with unbearable pain and the memories of the good times that we had together were swallowed by the condemnation of not having noticed the seriousness of Nick's illness. I couldn't take it. It was as if a dark could was above my head and no sunshine would ever be made available to me. It seemed like it would never end until I read the touching story of Horatio Spafford and how he handled the tragic, untimely deaths of his four daughters whom were on a transatlantic voyage. When he got the news of their deaths, instead of falling down and dying emotionally, he wrote the famous Christian hymn, " It Is Well with my Soul." That's when I realised that I needed to get up and rise above the pain. I had mourned long enough, it was time for a change. I decided to channel my energy back to the duty that had been placed in my hands: leadership. We, as the student council, rallied the school together, motivating all the sportsmen and those individuals in their respective clubs. We took the words that Nick had proclaimed, "Take All Leave Nothing" and drilled them into the students' minds. This resulted in the sporting teams: The Tigers( rugby team), Springboks(hockey team) and the Lions (soccer team) all having a remarkable year. The toastmasters club, the club that I was in charge of, went on to make great strides, with a lot of the gentlemen winning Public speaking awards. It turned out to be a year that I would never forget( for the right reasons).
I used to think that death was the end of it all, the destroyer of everything, but I learned that it can actually bring the finesse out of people. Looking back at what we did, I think of Napoleon Rich's words, think and grow rich. In our case, think and win everything. Nick's death may have been bad at first, but I used it as my Bugatti. I continued moving.
Nick's Death
"Nick, are you okay?" I asked him
"Yes, don't worry." He replied, whilst we were walking along a straight path, under the Jacaranda trees, which took us to the boarding houses.
Three days later, Nick passed away.
The day we got chosen as prefects were one of the best days of our lives. It was, simply, a beautiful day. After that, Nick and two other colleagues got picked to be our heads( Headboy, Deputy Headboy, and Senior Prefect) with Nick as our Headboy. We had both achieved our goals and that sense of achievement was overwhelming.
There was a night when I went into Nick's room and we started playing video games( Fifa 2016, NBA 2K16 and Assassin's Creed) on his laptop. It was all going well until he, all of a sudden, threw his controller onto the floor and told me that he wasn't feeling too good. I was shocked. Something was wrong because what he had done was out of character. Anyway, I just left it and moved on. The next day, he had to go for a checkup early in the morning and the medical diagnosis was that he had a chest infection. I went to get him when he came back from the hospital and they had loaded him with medication, but it didn't seem that serious. As we walked back to the hostel area, I asked him if he was alright and he responded confidently with a colorful smile, "why wouldn't I be." Unfortunately, I took those words in and didn't pay attention to the brevity of the situation. A few days later, he was rushed to the hospital and that's where he left us. My friend was gone. Our Headboy was gone. I was broken.
The next few weeks were the worst. Each day was filled with unbearable pain and the memories of the good times that we had together were swallowed by the condemnation of not having noticed the seriousness of Nick's illness. I couldn't take it. It was as if a dark could was above my head and no sunshine would ever be made available to me. It seemed like it would never end until I read the touching story of Horatio Spafford and how he handled the tragic, untimely deaths of his four daughters whom were on a transatlantic voyage. When he got the news of their deaths, instead of falling down and dying emotionally, he wrote the famous Christian hymn, " It Is Well with my Soul." That's when I realised that I needed to get up and rise above the pain. I had mourned long enough, it was time for a change. I decided to channel my energy back to the duty that had been placed in my hands: leadership. We, as the student council, rallied the school together, motivating all the sportsmen and those individuals in their respective clubs. We took the words that Nick had proclaimed, "Take All Leave Nothing" and drilled them into the students' minds. This resulted in the sporting teams: The Tigers( rugby team), Springboks(hockey team) and the Lions (soccer team) all having a remarkable year. The toastmasters club, the club that I was in charge of, went on to make great strides, with a lot of the gentlemen winning Public speaking awards. It turned out to be a year that I would never forget( for the right reasons).
I used to think that death was the end of it all, the destroyer of everything, but I learned that it can actually bring the finesse out of people. Looking back at what we did, I think of Napoleon Rich's words, think and grow rich. In our case, think and win everything. Nick's death may have been bad at first, but I used it as my Bugatti. I continued moving.
