Do What You Love and Love What You Do by Austin

Do What You Love and Love What You Do by Austin - November 2018 Scholarship Essay

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do.”

Whether it be a passion, a love, or a life-long oriented goal, my aunt told me these words before I left for vacation. Full of blazing sun rays, sandy white beaches, and the jams of a Mariachi band playing at the hotel, our family reunion trip began. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do”

Her last words.

Step by step as I walked up to my room, the hot, blazing sun internally faded as a sense of bone-chilling thoughts ran through my mind. A quick walk back from the pool began to form a rapidly growing cloud that surrounded my mind with darkness as I entered into a dreary and ironically cold atmosphere that could not have been more terrifying: endless pouring tears were streaming down my mother’s face. The second I saw her, I knew my mother had lost her sister. A stage 4 breast cancer survivor who beat the horrific illness once, had it return 5 years later. The cancer ate away at the marrow within her bones from the tip of her toes to the top of her brain. She suffered from metastatic cancer toppled with the return of stage 4 once again.

I couldn’t help but reminisce.

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do.”

These words represent all the lessons she taught me as a young adult -- to be wise with the handling of what value learning has within the world around us.

My heart dropped as I saw my Dad’s ghostly face as he comforted my mother.

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do.”

My aunt would teach me the value of these words through practicing how to purchase a Porsche -- the lesson of owning your passion. Owning your passion and love for what you do is something that I like to emulate in my daily life. Her passion for people was resembled through her love and her ability to light up a room. Her light continues to shine through me as she strengthens my ideas and relationships.

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do.”

Her words inspired me as well as my mother as we witnessed her goals and dreams fulfilled, creating an emphasis of what I placed on my shoulders and how I carry myself for my future successes while overcoming obstacles. Others do not see how we fall, but how we rise to our feet and carry on. The days in which we live must be spent to accomplish our dreams. It is up to one to chase after those goals and reach their own form of simplicity with happiness. That being said, she found this at the end of her life.

As I approach my mother and father, I can see in her eyes, my aunt's last words of wisdom: "do not count the days that go by in quantity but the quality of each day that runs through life.” A life lesson began and grew within me after that day, to respect and take the days that are given to me as a gifted chance, and to never forget each day is a blessing that has opportunity to make an impact on the world.

“Do What You Love and Love What You Do.”

I do.