'Fear once chained me.' - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Chaining Fear

Fear. Fear once chained me.

My first audition: as I stood in front of an informal panel of judges for a local audition: Naperville's Got Talent, my mind swarmed with worries: Will I get in? Is this song right? Am I ready for this? Do I look okay? My shaky hands stumbled across the piano keys, my voice cracked through my acoustic rendition of Lady Gaga's Paparazzi. Of course, I got cut.

Fear. How could such a small word stifle me, suffocate me? I feared my fear. Passion and apprehension knew no coexistence and I knew it. In the battleground between my dread of failure and my passion for performance, I began the counterattack.

November 2011, 8 A.M. I found myself standing in line, one of millions, to test my laborious efforts on the popular TV show America's Got Talent. After eight hours of waiting I stood in front of a few producers in a small room at McCormick Place.

It's got to happen, happen sometime. Maybe this time I'll win.
Fear? I broke free. Empowered. As I sang, not an ounce of the self-inflicted, cold-blooded cruelty could possibly shackle me.
In actuality, by definition, I was not fearless. Fear still nagged me throughout the eight hours of agonizing anticipation. And here's the catch: I got cut. Eradicating fear completely was and is, I daresay, impossible. My goal to conquer fear carried on through months of practice, through the eight hours of anticipation, through my performance of Maybe This Time, and through the auditions I participated in afterwards. I fought fear, suppressed fear and ultimately defeated fear. Conquering fear never meant that I would never be scared again or that I would never fail; it meant improvement upon errors, ignorance of insecurities, and a perseverance that endures despite any failure.

This is my second essay for priority filing at UIUC. I could use some help with the punctuation, and I'm also not sure if the essay is very coherent. The italics are song lyrics and the song title, but I'm not sure if its supposed to be punctuated that way. Thanks!

Hi

Two small changes --
My first audition: A s I stood in front of an informal panel of ...
November 2011, 8 AM: I found myself standing in line

I think your punctuation is all right.

I have a suggestion. Instead of writing "my first audition" and "november 2011," why don't you use some metaphors? Maybe, describe them with lines from some other songs, so that they will be in sync with the existing lyrics; although this can turn out to be a difficult job. Just food for thought. Anyway, back to the essay.


I think this is a slightly abrupt transition. Maybe, you should give the reader a glimpse of your thought process as you were battling your fear.