If you could give one piece of advice to your past self, what would it be and why? by Mitchell

If you could give one piece of advice to your past self, what would it be and why? by Mitchell - July 2025 Scholarship Essay

There was a time in my life when I moved to a new school. I had to learn the school’s rules and regulations, adjust to a new environment, and get used to the way people spoke. Even though it felt overwhelming to me and fixing my accent to sound the way other people want me to talk, the people, and even the subjects I was learning and I didn’t know anyone, and I often felt lost and unsure of myself. Sometimes I would struggle to learn new subjects in class, and I would feel overwhelmed about what we are learning i class, something I would struggle to figure out, and math questions that the teacher gives me, like homework or working alone. More than anything, I wanted to fit in, to sound like everyone else, to not stand out as the new kid from somewhere else. I became familiar with learning how to adjust, and I started to gain some confidence in myself. There was the process of learning my homework with my mom and even understanding the assignment they gave me through the help of my mom, and also learning how to make friends, even though the friends I had were bullies towards me. Still, every day with each small victory, understanding a lesson, making a new friend, or being able to talk out of my confront zone, I felt a little stronger in myself to start gaining some confidence. Looking back now, I realized lots of things that were not giving me were not shaping me in ways I couldn’t see at the time. If i could give one piece of advice to may past self, it would be about not feeding up on so many things that brings hardships and also not to be hard on myself, because thinking my younger self is i will spent so much time in my youth striving for perfection and feeling like I was never enough I worried about making mistakes, about not measuring up, and about what others thought of me and its about what i feel about myself. Through striving for perfection throughout my life, a really important thing to me. Whether it was my grades, or even how I acted around friends and family, or even acting passing the staar test and getting a pass rank, or even trying to make sure that my parents were proud of me I always felt like I had to get everything right to make sure that they happy with me. This pressure of striving for perfection made me feel doubtful of myself and even gave up on the word of perfection that came towards me. Making mistakes towards perfection was a hardship or even the end of the world, as I said. Or when i had to act the same way that my friends were acting or trying to make sure that they dont make funny of the mistake i made towards them, and sometime i would think about each mistakes that made in my head, and convince myself about the reality of a fool that i made of myself letting my self feeling left out or not wanting to talk about the mistakes that i made. Instead of learning from my mistakes, l let my mistakes distract me from what matters to me, but I became more afraid of what others thought about me, and also getting afraid of trying new things, but I would worry about trying to prove myself and fixing my mistakes. Most of my time, I struggle to realize the importance of not measuring up to myself or the ways others through of me. At one point, I felt that I thought more about myself than I started to care about what others thought about me, instead of facing the reality that I cared so much about what others thought of me. If I could go back in time, I would tell my younger self not to worry about what others think about you. Instead, I would focus on believing in myself, keep striving for the best, don't look back, and always be true to myself.