One Word, a Million Possibilities by Heidi

One Word, a Million Possibilities by Heidi - August 2013 Scholarship Essay

         I learned a very important lesson growing up, and it wasn’t interesting until I put the pieces together and thought “Huh.  What do you know about that.”  All throughout my elementary and middle school years, I had been the person to always say yes to people because I was too chicken to hurt their feelings by saying no.  People would ask me to help them when I didn’t really have time to help them.  They’d ask me to take over their parts in group projects when I had enough to do on my own with school and sports and volunteering.  But I said yes anyway.  I guess you could say it was a blessing in disguise- me saying yes to everyone.  My junior year of high school, I realized that trust is one of the best things you can get from someone, and loyalty is one of the best things you can give someone.  I figured out that the more you say yes, the more responsibility you get.  And the only way to gain someone’s trust is to take on responsibilities and prove to those people that you can handle it and keep your word.        Taking on responsibilities to gain trust isn’t necessarily interesting, but I had secretly been learning this lesson without even trying makes it that much more special.  Trust is an important characteristic to have because how can you have friends without trust?  How can you have friends without having a certain degree of loyalty?  Trust fuels any relationship, even with strangers you’ve just met.  People tend to trust people they’ve just met.  Why?  Because that person hasn’t given them a reason to not trust them.  So you give them responsibility.  People also tend to trust the people that consistently live up to their word.  To me, figuring out that saying yes more often leads to gaining trust was interesting because it also leads to more than just that.  Trust, loyalty, respect, good character… all budding from one little lesson.