"What My World Has Inspired Me to Be"
I am a young girl who was raised isolated and excluded from a mainstream community my whole life. I was always ignorant of what was going on in my community, thankfully in the end I understood it was all to my own benefit. The community where I come from is huge on conformation. Many of its residents tend to simply settle on earning a high school diploma. Others conform to no education at all or to just knowing one language. I was lucky to be excluded from this trend of conformation that even in my family I have seen. Since I have seen the results of conforming to the expectations of the community, I want to be the difference. I want to go off to college and succeed.
All my life I have refused to conform; I know what I want and I will not stop until I break the trend that unfortunately some people expect of me. I want to be an example to generations to come and be a motivation for those who like me, do not want to conform to the community's expectations.
I was unintentionally pushed away from a life of conformity by living in the outskirts of town. I grew up on a ranch excluded to what was going on in the city. At first, I felt some resentment toward my parents for basically excluding my sister and I from town, but as I matured, I realized why they did it and how it had helped me be where I am now. My community is filled with drugs, alcohol, gangs and teen pregnancy. I was never exposed to these things, therefore they never enticed me. When I started high school, I was suddenly exposed to all these things. Even my friends were being pulled into drugs, alcohol and procreating at a young age. Since I had not been around these temptations, I managed to push them away for good. I realized everything I had been saved from. Girls my age were having babies, other boys and girls began to associate themselves with gangs, they began to try drugs and alcohol and these changed their lives. It is not that some of my peers are unintelligent for choosing such path but it is a simple result of conformity. They have simply decided to conform to what everyone else in our community does.
In order to escape from the epidemic of conformity that revolves around my community I have had to do things now that will help me later in life. I set my own goals; I began to look at what universities were looking for in a student. Because of this I began to get involved in extracurricular activities such as, swimming. I also enrolled in clubs and began to volunteer my free time to organizations like
Pathfinders Club and Vacation Bible School. I enrolled in Advanced Placement classes, I raised my grades and I have pushed myself to my limits, especially in the past two years. I want to graduate from Lindsay High School and go off to a four year university where I can major in either Spanish or Psychology. I want to be a translator in the courts or be a psychologist. I feel that in this way I can give back to my community especially to those, as I know many, that only speak Spanish. I feel that I can be a translator for them or whoever needs the help.
My community has shaped me in so many ways, I am thankful to it as it is a huge part in what I am now. It is because I love and appreciate my community that I want to give back to it, so that one day I can teach other Hispanic girls and boys like myself, that we do not have to conform to what others do or what is expected of us because of our race or community. We can set our own principles and follow them until we prosper. I am a young girl with strong dreams, who rejects to imitate what has been going on in my community for so long.
All my life I have refused to conform; I know what I want and I will not stop until I break the trend that unfortunately some people expect of me. I want to be an example to generations to come and be a motivation for those who like me, do not want to conform to the community's expectations.
I was unintentionally pushed away from a life of conformity by living in the outskirts of town. I grew up on a ranch excluded to what was going on in the city. At first, I felt some resentment toward my parents for basically excluding my sister and I from town, but as I matured, I realized why they did it and how it had helped me be where I am now. My community is filled with drugs, alcohol, gangs and teen pregnancy. I was never exposed to these things, therefore they never enticed me. When I started high school, I was suddenly exposed to all these things. Even my friends were being pulled into drugs, alcohol and procreating at a young age. Since I had not been around these temptations, I managed to push them away for good. I realized everything I had been saved from. Girls my age were having babies, other boys and girls began to associate themselves with gangs, they began to try drugs and alcohol and these changed their lives. It is not that some of my peers are unintelligent for choosing such path but it is a simple result of conformity. They have simply decided to conform to what everyone else in our community does.
In order to escape from the epidemic of conformity that revolves around my community I have had to do things now that will help me later in life. I set my own goals; I began to look at what universities were looking for in a student. Because of this I began to get involved in extracurricular activities such as, swimming. I also enrolled in clubs and began to volunteer my free time to organizations like
Pathfinders Club and Vacation Bible School. I enrolled in Advanced Placement classes, I raised my grades and I have pushed myself to my limits, especially in the past two years. I want to graduate from Lindsay High School and go off to a four year university where I can major in either Spanish or Psychology. I want to be a translator in the courts or be a psychologist. I feel that in this way I can give back to my community especially to those, as I know many, that only speak Spanish. I feel that I can be a translator for them or whoever needs the help.
My community has shaped me in so many ways, I am thankful to it as it is a huge part in what I am now. It is because I love and appreciate my community that I want to give back to it, so that one day I can teach other Hispanic girls and boys like myself, that we do not have to conform to what others do or what is expected of us because of our race or community. We can set our own principles and follow them until we prosper. I am a young girl with strong dreams, who rejects to imitate what has been going on in my community for so long.