Prompt 2: Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are?
I would always sit on the edge of the bridge, watching cars pass by, hoping that one day I would have the guts to let go of the wall. Living through the hard times of my existence, seeing my father beat my mother until she could barely walk, watching my father lose his job again and again, and knowing that my mother would sneakily cut herself in the other room; I just couldn't bear this life anymore.
As I would sit up on that edge of the bridge I would stare down at the road, asking myself "Can I do it?" One day I convinced myself that I was going to jump, and I was a bit overwhelmed with my decision that I ended up confessing my thoughts to my grandmother when she had just asked how my day was going. Once I blurted everything out, tears quickly rolled down my cheeks as if it were a race. Then my grandmother told me nothing but this: "Deja de llorar y mirame. Ya sĂŠ que usted no tiene la mejor vida, pero la Ăşnica forma de escapar de ella es si seguias tu vida como un optimista."
To this day I have held my grandmothers words as my drive to succeed. Optimism made me a stronger person because now I face anything with determination and endurance. I embraced optimism, the treasured quality that I save my sisters with when they feel like life is deteriorating, and when my sisters feel like disappearing. I pick up their dignity and shower them with optimism, so they can walk tall again with their head held high, looking forward to the future. I gladly accept standing as a valiant role model - their heroine - the first Hernandez generation to attend a University, who yearns for a life more than my parents'. Optimism has driven me away from the petrified girl who couldn't face anything to the young heroine that continues to grow each day.
Wow, I applaude you for your honesty. This essay needs more elaboration, I would expand on your story. It leaves the reader a little shocked without a proper explanation/conclusion. Maybe translate what your grandmother said and show how to got to the mental place to understand the meaning. I would not say that optimism made you a better person, but instead, dig deeper and see what took to you to a place where optimism is the result. Explain how you are this "heroine" in more detail, and I would only use that term once. Also, you have not gotten into UC yet, so I would change the wording of that sentence.
