Becoming a Leader by Afsaneh

Becoming a Leader by Afsaneh - December 2021 Scholarship Essay

The pads of my fingers lightly touch the piano keys, hesitant, wary of the power they have to accidentally create an inharmonious sound. Under my hands, Chopin turns bleak, Debussy falls flat, and Beethoven loses his energy. As I continue to play, afraid of adapting to the new keys and notes, I become irrelevant background noise, providing no purpose.

My journey to becoming a leader has been a path filled with obstacles. At a young age, I was inspired by my mother a Vietnamese immigrant, to become a teacher. Despite coming to the country not knowing a word of English, with a lot of passion, hard work, and patience, she taught me how to speak the language, inspiring me to become the teacher I’d had growing up. However, my hope of becoming a teacher was met with disdain. In my parents’ eyes, I was meant to be a doctor. Their skepticism was rooted in the Model Minority Myth, the belief that Asians must be highly successful to have “made it.” Their high expectations for me lowered my faith in myself because to them I was making the biggest mistake. Thus, afraid to disappoint my immigrant parents and the American dream they envisioned, fought, and worked hard for, I censored my voice and actions to be seen as dutiful and obedient. I spoke only when spoken to and did what I was asked—the perfect eldest daughter.
In high school, I was given the opportunity to join the speech and debate team. The event gave me the outlet I needed: a platform to speak. At first, I struggled. Speaking fluently and having confidence in the arguments I made was something I lacked, so much so that the year passed with little progress. That summer, my debate team hired a consultant. When we debated in front of him, it was clear from the doubt in my voice that I lacked confidence in myself. After struggling with a particular drill, he pulled me aside and gave me eye-opening advice: to yell. Yell like I was angry, yell like I badly wanted something. And I did exactly that. I forced myself to do drill after drill, yelling at my mirror, yelling at my partner, making sure I was heard, adapting to the obstacles I faced such as my lack of confidence. I would spend hours doing this every week, every chance I had until I began seeing improvements.

The chance to test my dedication to becoming a leader presented itself my junior year when I became the captain of my Public Forum debate team. Helping so many students of different skill levels and backgrounds originally presented a challenge and forced me to adjust to each student’s needs. However, just as I became more familiar with this form of leadership, I hit a roadblock when I was left without a partner two months into the season. This massive obstacle was one that made me doubt my ability to continue leading the debate team. However, my coach quickly assigned me to become partners with a novice debater, someone who had little experience. While this proved to be a difficult task, it was one that taught me the importance of adaptation. I found myself working harder than before, creating different drills and assignments that would help my new partner become more familiar with the topic. I would create sessions in which we would focus on different topics both of us struggled with, this ranged from doing speech redos to analytical debates, in which we only argued using logic. Eventually, I realized that teaching wasn’t about making others follow you, but rather, it required me to adapt to them. My successes with my new partner additionally affected the rest of my team as well. With my other teammates, I focused on the basics, learned their weaknesses, and then planned drills to hone their skills. I gave each person an opportunity to express themselves, simultaneously giving myself the best experience of all: solidifying my love for helping others grow. My journey highlighted the importance of being a leader with the ability to adapt. By adapting to each team member I was able to create a safe platform that allowed for each person to reach their full potential.

My hands brush the final key, listening to the sound drift through the auditorium before dissolving into the quiet air. There is no hesitation, just pure bliss. I close my eyes and enjoy the beautiful sounds that I helped make.