Confidence by Alyana

Confidence by Alyana - December 2022 Scholarship Essay

“What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.” Ralph Waldo Emerson spoke a truth that hides in the deepest, most-ignored shadows of every human soul. Fear—and knowing the need to face that fear—is universal. Everyone knows that confronting the thing they dread will grow and change and stretch them, but who would ever willingly endure that misery? This past year, I was dumped head-first into many of my fears. I, rather unwillingly, learned lessons that give me courage and confidence as I look into this new year, and all the fears and opportunities it brings.
For the first seventeen years of my life, I lived in the same state, the same community. Then, in August 2022, my family and I—which consists of me, five brothers, my parents, my aunt, five goats, two rabbits, two dogs, and a fish—picked up and moved from Illinois to California. My perfect little life imploded, and I had to start all over again. Friends? How does one make those again? Build a community? Was it this hard before? I had to relearn and recreate, and frankly still am relearning and recreating, everything. The move held terrors in abundance: will we find a house, what schools are the right ones to choose, how do we find new friends? We still do not have a house, the schools are not exactly stellar, and good friends are difficult to gain. However, facing theses fears, journeying into the unknown with a spirit of adventure and faith, has grown my capabilities and stretched my capacities in ways I never could have foreseen. I learned to face my fears and explore the unfamiliar with confidence. In this next year, I will be able to enter new situations, like college and adulthood, with the assurance that I can adapt to the unpredictable, because I have done it before.
I learned to face my fears during 2022, which gives me courage to face new ones in 2023. Every human is forced to face their fears, and every human never wants to undergo that hardship. I would never have chosen to experience the heartbreak of moving, but I am grateful for how it has grown my character and capacities. As I look ahead towards turning eighteen and entering college, I do so with the confidence that, while I am afraid, it is what I most need to do.