The Power of a Warning by Natalie

The Power of a Warning by Natalie - September 2022 Scholarship Essay

“Life is going to get harder.” 6 words, 22 letters, a phrase that would have prepared me for what was to come. I am aware that conventionally, this is not something that you would want to tell your younger self. However, for me that is not the case. I have always been the kind of person to want to be prepared for what's to come. But also the kind of person to have a positive outlook on life, and the kind to see the best in a person or a situation.

Up until I was twelve, my only concern was making sure my divorced parents stayed civil enough to raise me. I thought this would be the end of my struggles in my life, however that proved to not be the case. I would soon have to learn how to not only take care of my mother, who was riddled with cancer, but also myself. As my mother could not do that for me. I would soon learn how to move to and from my hometown, each time leaving something behind and starting from scratch. I would soon learn the feeling of loneliness at night and the familiar feeling of a gaping hole in my heart that comes with the loss of the people you love. First my mother, to bone cancer, then my best friend of 11 years, to a meaningless argument.

It is for these things I wish I was warned. To be able to mentally prepare rather than being thrown into what felt like a corn maze in the middle of the night with no flashlight.

However, I was not and maybe it made me a better person for it. This information would have drastically changed my outlook on life, and thus my character. The bubbly person who cares too much could have just as easily became a person who was obsessive with seeing the signs and figuring out a way to fix it, destroying relationships along the way.

So, although I wasn’t given a warning for the troubles I would face, it made me who I am today. After all, for every action comes an equal and opposite reaction.