My Revised Attempt at Authenticity
During what feels like an eternity ago but was actually last summer, college applications loomed over life, the universe, and everything. I had spent months before the fall deadlines brainstorming pages, trying to find the perfect little story to sum up my life to indifferent admissions officers. When I wasn’t satisfied with any of it, I sank. None of my copious preparation and drafting yielded exactly what and how I wanted to portray myself. For the first half of my senior year, I was anxious but too uninspired to work on my applications. I kept them out of sight and mind for weeks. Not even this ultimate common application essay could break my procrastinating nature, further feeding into my confirmation bias: if you’re anything like me, your best ideas always seem to come in the nick of time. Half blessing, half curse, my indecisiveness is something I’ve learned to roll with because I know that once an idea does take hold in my mind, I do everything in my power to grow something wonderful out of it.
I read recently that around 70% of people hate hearing their own voice played back to them. Unfortunately for me, as a writer and a musician, I am 100% this person. Ever since I started writing my own fairy tales in elementary school, I hid my stories from everyone. I felt proud yet ashamed of myself and my writing, and above all, I hated the idea of sharing it with others. It felt like showing off, but it also made me doubt my abilities if others didn’t understand it. Out of fear and with chagrin, I let only two people read this essay after I finished drafting it: my college counselor and my boyfriend. I sobbed inexplicably in voiceless embarrassment when my counselor complimented my style and the way I told my story. It was greater praise than I was prepared to hear for an idea I had built myself up to that point. In many ways, this essay shows my struggle with developing authenticity, not just for the sake of my achievements, but for my own peace of mind. This past year, I’ve learned the value of accepting myself wherever I’m at, which necessitates coming to terms with my past and directing my will toward my future.
College admissions are an absolute farce in this country. Contrary to high school culture and delicate traditions, there are far worthier, more just causes to cry over. I count myself lucky to have gained something more from the process than a heaping pile of debt and to have amazing support from my family and friends. To anyone applying or waiting to apply, just remember: you are enough, you can only do your best, and then it’s out of your hands. If a school rejects you, then so what? If they accept you, then you know you are more than deserving to be there.
At last, I’m proud to present my common app essay, mostly original with a few extra words to clarify some incomplete thoughts. Please enjoy one of my favorite things I’ve ever written.
“John Muir once wrote, ‘In every walk with nature, one receives more than he seeks.’ Well, the first time I visited Yosemite National Park, all I could think about at six years old was the cold. Sure, the view was wider and deeper and brighter than any I had beheld through my binoculars, but, in the end, the waterfalls, the sea of pines, and the granite palace were beyond my enjoyment. Family trips like those made only a fleeting impact on me, an Asian girl with tunnel vision but not approaching Tunnel View. For the first fourteen years of my life, I was raised by tiger parents. Like the stereotypical Asian immigrant child, I was drilled to shoot for the moon and achieve nothing less than a landing. It’s hard to say whether I was stretched thin, but I rarely complained: I was made to excel in school, sports, music, and daughterhood. Driving to a place where all my achievements fell away felt oddly hypocritical. I questioned my parents’ motives for brining me to a paradise just to admire it from my car seat. I couldn’t have cared less about the glacial history of Half Dome, the number of gallons of water spewed from Vernal Falls each year, and other meaningless information about which my parents pretended to care. Back then, we knew we didn’t belong in that crowd of nature lovers.
In contrast to the bleak stone faces in Yosemite, the childhood trips that stayed with me were exclusively to the Philippines, my parents’ homeland. Something about returning there resonated more deeply than any American landscape, even for a girl who lived her whole life in the United States. Solitary activities like reading in my dad’s childhood home during a thunderstorm or watering my grandmother’s jungle in the tropical heat enriched my introverted nature. One morning during my trip in 2018, I woke up at dawn, crept through the comfortably silent house, and found the dining table set with steaming rice, sizzling bacon and eggs, and, of course, fresh-cut mangos. In a sweep of passion similar to Miyazaki’s “Spirited Away”, I imagined ghosts running the place, cooking, cleaning, whispering behind closed doors. I thought of my grandmother, who had woken before the rest of us to bring the house to life. She had passed away three years prior. In the midst of this sudden onset of sadness, I realized that I could never be alone, that I could never be without a purpose. ‘Think about who you are and who you come from.’ My grandmother, my parents, my voracious ancestors from whom I live worlds of time apart, they all reside in me. If they could defy, as doctors, lawyers, immigrants, women, what can stop me?
Fast forward to high school. Once it registered that I had four years left before college, my parents decided to increase and expand our family trips. My dad learned all there is to know about camping, backpacking, and hiking, and in the last four years, we’ve visited ten national parks. At first, I joined my parents feeling resentful and internally grimacing at underwhelming memories of long car rides and empty silence in the wild. Eventually, I realized the beauty of nature in my own way. There I was, sitting on a wooden plank nailed into the slope of Half Dome about three-quarters of the way to the top. I gazed at my parents below me and into the eternal sea of pines and granite flanks, exhausted as I had ever been, but at peace as I had never been. This harrowing journey to Half Dome had simultaneously torn me down and built me up, exposing my raw capabilities and motivations. I relish this achievement as one of many where I landed on the moon for my own fulfillment and pleasure. In whatever I pursue, whether it be medicine, journalism, or music, I now recognize the value of my support systems. With this wisdom, I will be the one to come, see, and summit.”