I remember sitting down in my front yard with some of my friends and looking up at the sky to look at the clouds. When I looked up, I could see a person with a crown on their head, when my friend looked up he saw an animal, "it looks like a lion", he said. Then the last person who looked up at the clouds said he saw a drum with two sticks by the side. Now I know that this experience is not limited to me and my friends, this is something that most people can relate to but this moment stuck out to me because it just shows how differently everyone can view the same thing. The brilliance of this moment is that it is probably the best example of what the mindscape is all about. It shows how the perspective of three different people was completely different even though they were looking at the same thing, at the same time. And based on the dedication of the mindscape podcast, this is one of the most significant things to understand and admire about the world, and if we want to understand it, different views must be appreciated. The extraordinary way of the universe makes it hard to understand, but it is possible. Within how complex it may be, creating the time to understand concepts and ideas about the universe is the only way we can also take care of it best. Having an understanding of anything in life gives you an edge over it because then only can you work out how to use it, work with it, and work in it. "Life is unfair", and that might be true, but I claim that if people educate themselves on the nature of this world, and understand how the universe exists, it will be less surprising when "unknown" events happen to them. I believe there are three main ideas and concepts to help us understand the universe. The first concept, which was mentioned earlier, is Learning/education. Benjamin Franklin once said, "An investment in knowledge pays the best interest." Education is a pathway to knowledge and information, and information leads to understanding. Education enlightens the mind and gives you a concept about the world that you did not realize existed. To understand the world, there is a need to study it, and learn about it, what is the nature of the universe we live in? are there other possible forces acting upon the existence of the world? Can the universe grant you luck? These are the sorts of questions I start to ask when I am learning about the universe. Another concept that I think will help us is Experiments/taking risks. This is the most delicate idea but I think it is necessary to do to facilitate and confirm our knowledge about the universe. for example, is the world imbalanced? so if you show an act of kindness to someone, do you also receive something nice from someone? so then try it out, act great to people and see if the universe will reward you. Another example could be, are there extra forces acting on the universe? so can you pray and ask for something? will you get it? Exploring the answers to these questions is how I can find out how to understand our universe. Lastly, religion is a very vital concept that leads to a better knowledge of our world. There are different perspectives on the universe (as we established earlier), and one of these, is how religious beliefs shape the world. As the world evolves and changes, religion has been proven to remain the same, and the idea within religion is always the same. Religion's perspective on the world has always been constant, so if we are looking to keep learning about the universe, taking into account the different perspectives in the world is very vital. I look into my religion to start from the beginning, to ask, how the world was created? or who decided what names we give to humans and animals? and so much more, because everything in the world begins from a point in existence.

In my life, it has been hard to find people who are genuinely willing to help or give their best for you to succeed in life. I have always been very conservative, so no one really knows what is going on with me. But since I came to this country, I have found out that people will be willing to help you if they know what your goals and ambitions are. It makes sense, nobody will be willing to help you if they do not know what they are helping you for. And that is why I have only found three people that have been influential in my educational journey. My parents have been the most influential people in my education. They have always had my back during my school journey. Before coming to the United States, I have seen them struggle to pay for my school fees. My parents will work every day for a month to get the amount needed to pay for the fees and they will starve themselves some nights just to make sure what they got is enough to feed the family and provide for us. There were days I would come back home with a grade of B, and I will be so happy heading back home, but when I get home and show my mom my grades, she is not satisfied, she wants me to be better, to do better. She believes I can get a better grade than that and that has taught me to not be satisfied with what I have but to strive to do better. Their constant demands that I should be better in school has been one of the biggest reasons why I am and still doing well in my education. I attended a community college in Chicago and just graduated last year, and in there was where I met someone with one of the most beautiful hearts. My student-athlete counselor, Jodi-Ann Browning-Bent, in such a short time has become one of the most important people in my education journey. She has been so influential in my decision-making about my education since I started going to college. With her help, I made a great plan from day one as to how I wanted to just spend 2 years in a community college, and she said "Okay, we would make that work", and we did! Jodi helped me achieve much more in school because she took away the load of me worrying about what class is right, or which professor is perfect, she just let me get on with being a student and focus on excelling in my studies. It is underrated what having a good counselor can do for a student, and that is why I consider her to be very important in my education journey so far. In the future, my plan is to work with the teenagers of the community and build a center for them to express their talents and showcase what they can do. I do not want young kids to grow up and not be given the opportunity to show the world what they got inside of them. I think it is very important to give them that platform and opportunity. I would also like to do something like this, to be in a position where I can offer financial assistance to students who want to further their education. I want them to not worry about the financial side of education and to just focus on learning and gaining the knowledge they need.

The greatest challenge me and my family faced when coming to the US was accommodation. I came to this country with my three siblings and my mum. We did not know who to trust to help us find a good place to be able to live. When we first got to the United States, we stayed with one of my aunties from my father's side. They were really nice and took care of us while we were there, but she always was not comfortable with having another family living with her. My parents tried to find a place while we were living with her, but it was really difficult without a solid income, and most owners would not accept a family without a reliable source of income. This led to us moving around from place to place. We had to leave my aunt's house and then we pleaded with my uncle and his wife to let us stay with them while we settle down. They agreed to let us stay with them if we find a place to move to in two weeks. My mum agreed because she was desperate and did not want her kids to be living on the streets. It was close to the two weeks and we still could not find a place to stay! And one of the reasons why this was also difficult was because my mom already had a job offer in Chicago, but she chose to move to Maryland, Washington because my aunty promised she was going to help her settle down in Maryland, but she did not keep to her word. My mum was devastated, she did not know what to do, and with her kids with her it was tough on her. So, after the two weeks deadline we were given, we had to move out, so she called a friend in Baltimore, and we moved there and stayed there for 1 week. During that time my mom called the job in Chicago, to ask them if they still would like to hire her and they said yes and that was how our lives without a roof on our heads started to change for the better. I feel like this challenge me, and my family faced together made us stronger, smarter, more plan-orientated, strengthened our belief in God, and gave us an insight into how difficult it will be to live in a different country. Having to go through all of that also made me realize that you cannot count on everyone regardless of if they are family or not. You always need a plan to move forward in life. That was one of the mistakes my parents made. Without a good plan of how to adapt to a new country, just relying on others is not sufficient when making such big changes in our lives. Since that period, any decision or action I want to take in my life, the first thing I do is to pray about it and place it in front of God, and then I make a plan of what I want to do and believe that God will make it happen. It was not a nice experience to go through for the first few months in the United States, but for the experience and the lessons, I have learned I would not change it for anything.

When we (me, my 3 siblings and my mum) moved to Chicago from Baltimore city in Maryland, my aunt decided to take us in, since she had one bedroom that was available. She told us that we would have to pay for it every month and we accepted. It was so beneficial because my mum just got a new job in Chicago and we did not have a place to stay, so staying with family seemed like a good option until we get a new apartment to live in. We found a good school to attend, the new job was going great, and everything seemed fine. But after three months, I was coming back from school and met my sister in front of the apartment, and she told me she received a message from my aunt that our luggage is in the basement and we should leave her house. I was surprised, I thought my sister was joking but we went into the basement and it was a reality. I could not understand why this happened, it felt like I was in a nightmare, I began to ask myself questions of what could have possibly gone wrong. It was close to April, so I even thought that she was trying to prank us for April fool’s day, that was how unreal I felt the whole situation was. My mum was at work, so we called her and told her what happened, but she could not leave till later in the evening. I had to take responsibility and I decided we stay in the basement till we figure out what to do. This situation affected me emotionally and mentally. I felt so betrayed by someone I love that I did not know how to act amongst friends anymore. I was always thinking to myself, “Can I trust him? Can I trust her?” This happened for days. Then I realized that I need to get over this feeling if I want to live a good life. All that uncertainty and dislike I felt towards people had to go for me to be able to move forward. I got over this by deciding to forgive my aunt and let her know that I hold no ill feelings towards her. I had a one-on-one chat with her, and I remember saying to myself that it felt like I had the weight of the world off my shoulder. The reason why I picked this adversity is because it changed me and gives me added motivation till now. I felt powerless that day. My little sister was crying, not because of what happened but because there was spiders, cockroaches and bugs in the basement, and she was so scared she wanted to run away from the place. I could not bear to see that happen again so everyday of my life I use that as a fuel to become better in my career and in academics. I told myself that I will do what it takes to become successful and provide a better life for my family. That day made me realize that no matter where you are in life, never feel comfortable, always thrive to do better, be better and achieve better. I have always believed that to be great you must work hard and have faith in your dreams, and I believe 100 percent in what I want to become in life. In the future I want to be able to help the people from the town I came from, those people that live on the streets, I want to be able to provide them with shelter and clothes. My plan is to build a legacy where I can be confident that my work has had a major impact in the world we live in.