Hi, I was wondering if anybody could read my Common App draft. The biggest problem is obviously the length, which is around 1000 words when I have heard the length should be more around 5-600, so I would appreciate criticisms of where I could cut/revise to make the essay significantly shorter. Thanks! Edit - I don't know if it matters what schools I'm applying to, or if it would change the level of criticism I receive, but my top 2 choices are Penn's Wharton School (Early Decision) and MIT (Early Action).
Option #1. Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
Step one: Wake up. The BEEP of my alarm breaks the blissful silence of sleep. To the rest of my friends, it's barely dawn. To me, it's the start of a new day.
Step two: Pool time. It's still dark. My weary limbs urge me to go back to bed, but my ambitious heart encourages me to move forward. Everything seems to move in slow-motion as I dive into the pool, dreading the moment my body finally makes contact with the frigid water. Splash. The water jolts every one of my nerves and washes my drowsiness away. The water transforms me into Michael Li - Swimmer. Now ready, I devour whatever workout Coach throws at me. The next two hours is my time to get better, stronger, faster. For the next two hours, there is one thing on my mind: train until my arms are too tired to lift my aching body out of the pool.
Step three: Repeat - only three hundred days left. This is swimming, the sport that I've grown up with since I was five. Sound painful? It is. But by the time I entered high school, I had grown used to this cycle. I had grown used to falling asleep while thinking about what swimming has done for me. I was used to craving that adrenaline-fueled feeling of slamming that touchpad in the pool and looking up at the scoreboard to see a number one by my name. I dreamed of that feeling of screaming in victory as the crowd roars and my teammates jump along the side of the pool deck in triumph of my special performance gleaned from years of hard work. Sounds excellent? It is. That euphoric feeling has kept me loving the sport since I started. However, after twelve years of relentless training and competition, what has taught me most is not the split-second touch of victory, but the long stretch of perpetual failure.
Rewind to the end of my first year in high school. The big race has finally come. Championships. It is my last chance to make that Sectional time cut I've been training towards for two years. I haven't done well in any previous races for a while, so that time cut has cruelly taunted me from 0.09 seconds away, the time it takes to blink. But right now, none of that matters. It's time to bring on something extraordinary. I slam the touchpad. Look up. Taunting. Disappointment expands in me, starting from my stomach until I'm too sick to even think. I hate this sport. I'm just not good enough.
When I was fifteen, my swimming performance hit a long plateau in a sport where improving is everything. The plateau hit me like a train. It took all the fun out of swimming, and caused doubt to obscure the path to my goals. I began to fear diving into a race instead of relishing it because I feared that feeling of disappointment. Everything that used to ignite a fire in me began to work against me. My passion for competition and victory used to make swimming fun. But now, with passion shrouded by insecurity, I struggled to find the confident Michael Li - Swimmer, who I had come to know so well. It became immensely more difficult for me to wake up everyday and practice, hours before sunrise. All that was in the back of my mind was: "I'm not going to improve even if I do this." I felt like there was a pile of bricks suffocating me, preventing me from physically moving or mentally becoming motivated. Soon, the swimming plateau began to affect my life outside the pool. Usually always joking, my humor and attitude were dampened, and for good reason. Something I had always remembered as a cherished haven had been stolen from me. Something I had always loved to do, competitively, or just as a way to pass time, had been torn away. "Is this the end of my ten-year swimming career?"
Those sentiments of frustration were shallow. I sat down by myself and reflected. After 80,000 hours of devotion, swimming had become a huge part of who I was, and would no doubt shape who I would become. One of the earliest lessons swimming taught me was to never give up. When I was seven, swimming taught me to fight the fatigue during lap two of a race. When I was twelve, swimming taught me to attack race two with everything I had, even if race one hadn't gone my way. Most importantly, swimming taught me that nothing special is accomplished without confidence. How could I let myself forget who I was? Quitting would leave a void in me, only to be filled with regret.
I kept going. I kept training, and I kept racing. The will to cling onto something that by this point in my life had become a part of me kept my resolve firm. My fuel was passion.
Fast forward to the end of my sophomore year. The big race has finally come, yet again. Championships. It is that crucial time again, my last chance of the season to get that Sectional cut that's been taunting me for three years now. 0.09. I hit the touchpad. Look up. Suddenly, nothing else seems to matter as I raise a single fist and punch the air, splashing water all around me. I can barely see, hear, or think. But I can feel. Success. Finally. It's that feeling I've worked so hard for, and dreamed of for so long. Oh, how I've missed you. But this time, my exultation was tempered by a mindful satisfaction. The roar of victory around me also echoed all the times that I told myself I couldn't do it, and all the times I forced myself to keep going anyways.
In retrospect, maybe it was my coach, actually yelling at me to "KEEP GOING!" during every practice. But maybe it was something else. There was always a glimmer of determination within me when I woke up, breaking those metaphoric bricks on my chest. After all, I did manage to get up. Everyday. There is nothing I am more proud of doing than persevering. During my plateau, I had forsaken the idea that anything could be done with hard work. Now, I teach my own young swimmers the same words I had belittled, partly as their coach, but partly as an experienced swimmer myself. "Kids, anything can be done with a little hard work, determination, and belief." I am their mentor. Swimming is mine. BEEP! Guess it's time to wake up again.
In this kind of essay, I would not use all caps, like BEEP, and KEEP GOING. It is better to just use " " marks. Using all caps is informal and sloppy.
:-)
You can cut the "Step one" etc.
Like this:
Wake up. The BEEP of my alarm breaks the blissful silence of sleep. To the rest of my friends, it's barely dawn. To me, it's the start of a new day.
Pool time. It's...
I guess I think you can cut much of this paragraph or the whole thing:
When I was fifteen, my swimming performance hit a long plateau in a sport where improving is everything. The plateau hit me like a train. It took all the fun out of swimming, and caused doubt ... ------It expresses a theme of "not giving up," but that is cliche.
I think you should cut out al unnecessary details. How do you know if it is unnecessary? Ask yourself if it helps transmit your main idea, your most important idea.
What is the most important idea? It's the idea that makes the reader believe that you really are serious about achieving goals that are part of a plan you have for a meaningful career.
Inspire the reader!
:-)
