My name is Chretianne Isabelle. Pronounced "Cray-dee-yin." However, for school, I've always just gone by 'Isabelle' or 'Izzy." I, personally, used to hate the name Chretianne. I always got embarrassed when substitute teachers pronounced my name wrong. I've been called every name you could think of: Croissant, Crayola, Christian, Crustacean. Then came the teasing for months about the plethora of mispronunciations of my name. Furthermore, I often got shamed for not being able to fit my whole name on ID cards or the class rosters. I've even somehow been told by peers that "Chretianne isn't my first name" and was some imaginary label for me to be "cool" or "quirky." But sadly no, Chretianne is not some secret spy name or alias to cover up my pretty awesome identity. In college, I started to find the beauty in my name. It was unique. I've been asked if Chretianne meant anything in my mother tongue, but even then, there is literally no meaning behind my name. There is no meaning in any language. There isn't necessarily a meaning behind my name other than that it represents me- unique as well. I've created a variety of different meanings for my name on my own based on my interests, passions, and hardships throughout my life. And even to this day- 19 years later- the meaning behind my name changes constantly, similar to how I am changing constantly. As far as I know, I am the only person in the world with this name, and it makes me feel so special. My name serves to remind me that I am important and that I am powerful. It reminds me that I am my own incredible person with flaws, talent, beauty, and struggles. As a person with severe comparison issues, Chretianne prompts me to see that I am my own individual with my own distinct traits and quirks that essentially make me who I was, who I am, and who I want to be. I've tried to introduce myself as Chretianne more often, but people typically ask me to go by a different name just to suit THEIR preferences and comfortability. I used to always ask myself, 'Why am I changing MY name for THEM?' I remember when I first joined my college cheerleading team, and I introduced myself as Chretianne. Seconds later, they had asked me to go by a different name because it was too difficult for them to remember or pronounce. Yet it's MY name and the name I prefer to go as. I always got made fun of for choosing to go by Chretianne, when I had always gone by Isabelle for years. I never necessarily wanted to go by my other name, but I was always fit into this tiny box labeled 'Isabelle.' This has been a challenge for me because I feel like Isabelle had also made up a very large and important part of my life. I wouldn't be who I am today without Isabelle. So nowadays, I just simply use both. I am both Isabelle and Chretianne. I am not one without the other. I use both interchangeably and there isn't necessarily any specific scenario when I use one over the other. I think my names are both exceptionally beautiful and extraordinary and that is all that matters. I love my identity and am very proud of my name and its power.

I love nature because it enabled me to understand myself better. Falling deep into academics, I stopped making the time to explore the world around me. I caved into the work-life and forgot about the experiences nature has to offer me to grow as an individual. As someone who used to go on weekly drives to explore, the lack of adventure and surrounding myself with nature took a toll on my mental health. Something I was once enamored with, I slowly stopped to appreciate. It wasn't until recently when my mental health took a low, and I forced myself on a walk to let out some built up stress, did I begin to appreciate nature again. I sat on a bench at my local park at almost midnight, looked up at the stars, and I finally felt like I could breathe again. It felt like I was at ease for the first time in years. Night walks slowly became opportunities for me to take photos of the stars, which then turned into me doing my homework on a park bench just to feel the sun and appreciate the trees and animals. This then turned to walks and videos of the beach and ocean, to share why special moments like these mean to me with a special person. I realized that that moment where I feel so relaxed and at one with nature is what I wanted to live for. So this is why I decided to dedicate my career to the conservation of nature it's surreal beauty. I want to travel the world one day and appreciate nature from every continent and from every season. Nature means an opportunity for me to appreciate my progress in life, despite the hardships. For now, it'll all be nature documentaries until then.

1.) I consider myself a part of an underrepresented group because of the intergenerational trauma that I was left to cope with. I grew up convinced that my food was disgusting, that having darker skin tone was unattractive, that chinky eyes made me "want to eat dogs," and that having an accent made me silly. I was always told that I was the "lucky one" in my family because I had lighter skin, when my skintone shouldn't even be an advantage for me to begin with. Because of the taunting and bullying, I begged my parents to let me buy the school lunches like everybody else (no matter how much better tasting my home food was), I sought lighter skin, and I only spoke English at home. I became ashamed of my own culture and I tried to hide it as much as possible, forgetting cultural customs and traditions. I started to hold this sort of resentment towards my family for trying to keep me in touch with my Filipino side when I tried for so long to break free. This influenced my personal growth because I lost sight of where I came from and I lost my cultural pride. But at the same time, I was given an opportunity to rediscover my love for my home and heritage. As I slowly learn and reflect on the intergenerational trauma and colonial mentality that I have dealt with, I have been able to regain my cultural pride and appreciation. 2.) I think that a primary barrier to fulfilling my career goals in conservation is the lack of respect that those working towards sustainability receive. It may not garner the most amount of money, but it's such a core responsibility that should be instilled within us, knowing that we only have one home and that's Earth. I think that while most people understand environmental concern, they don't seem to understand the urge for environmental protection. It's difficult to educate people when they refuse to comprehend and take responsibility. I frankly believe that it's somewhat selfish for one to understand the ongoing climate crisis and then to be in denial and disregard the consequences and not take action on their behalf. Another barrier that I can see possibly arising in my career in conservation is knowing the time gap that we have. I know that at least for me, there were times where I felt hopeless about saving the planet. Reading the statistics is scary to me, and I dread seeing all the documentaries on Netflix about how much we've destroyed our home. I know that while I try to garner all the skills necessary for me to truly learn more about conservation, the clock is still running. 3.) I feel like I've always had a fondness for Earth and science. At first I wanted to major in veterinary sciences, then it was oceanography and geology, then marine biology, then ecology, then finally Environmental Studies. I think that the benefits of environmental conservation and interdisciplinary studies is that they touch a bit on all of these disciplines one way or another. But at the end of the day, I knew that I wanted to work with Earth. Especially with understanding the ongoing climate crisis and my role in it, I have become active in changing my ways to combat climate change, but I hope to encourage others to do the same. I have an even stronger dedication to saving the planet because I want to do the job that many others don't want to do. I may not be into politics, but I have enough drive to learn about environmental policy if it means that I can somehow change the planet just a little bit. I like to think that if somebody sees me passionate about what I do, then maybe they'll be passionate about the Earth as well. Knowing that this is an issue that affects everybody is what has encouraged me to help my community. 4.) While living in San Francisco, I've come to understand how much potential my city has for studying environmental change. Especially with the large population, large consumption of resources, and new ways of living, there's promise for change. I want to study environmental policy to find new solutions to combat a variety of issues such as air pollution, deforestation, pollution, climate change, the destruction of ecosystem, etc and to be able to actually implement laws and regulations to aid with this. Understanding our (humans) role in environmental change it's crucial. It's not just about learning how to come up with new solutions that essentially "band aid" the issues, it's also about understanding where we stand and our OWN contribution to the destruction of our planet and how we can break these unhealthy habits.

I think the best way to live a long, healthy life is to do weekly, or even daily assessment of your life. I think that we often forget to step back to look at our progress and room for growth. We are so obsessed with outcomes that we forget to take care of ourselves. But if we just hesitate for a few moments to think about how far we've come and how much more we can handle, it protects us from the mental strains of over-exhausting ourselves to see results. It's useless to see results if we're too burnt out to do anything with them. It's such a simple and core concept, but we fail to remember how essential it is in our everyday lives. We like to keep working and working, and we even have the tendency for self degradation when we don't see results that we want. We get used to comparing ourselves to one another that we neglect our own self progress. Affirmations are aimed towards reminding us that we are not defined by our external successes. When we check in with ourselves, we learn about self appreciation and worth. We can look at our task list and take down each assignment with more courage that we are capable of taking it on. If we need to reassess, then we can then determine what else we need to do for ourselves, whether it's a short walk to recoup, a day off, or seeking extra support. We need to understand our limits and to recognize when it's time to do things differently. If we're constantly running and running, then we forget to catch our breath and take care of ourselves.