I barely remember my life before the COVID-19 pandemic, but one memory never faded, even six years later. To combat loneliness and spiraling anxiety, I used to spend hours rewriting myself into my favorite shows and books. In those stories, I could pretend I was worthy of love and admiration. For a few hours a day, I could pretend I was enough. Until something shifted within me. I had a quiet realization… one that shattered the imaginary world I had hidden in for so long: I would never find the love and acceptance I so desperately sought. Not in the real world. Not in any way that mattered. The thought hollowed me out, like my heart was ripped out of my chest, leaving a profound nothingness. Younger me thought it was a superpower. A simple way to avoid my emotions and not be the “crybaby” my family always labeled me as. Whenever things got tough, or I felt my eyes tearing up. I used that ‘power’ often. Whenever I got into an argument with my family, or when I watched sad movies, or even when I got too stressed, I would revert to numbness. In a way, it was easier. But even as I got older, that emptiness never left. That ‘power’ was now a curse I could no longer control, a cage I could not escape. I started to see myself as more machine than human, a constant project to alter and fix. The days blurred together. I went to class, did my work, and played my after-school sports. Spent hours self-reflecting and ‘fixing’ myself, one flaw at a time. From the outside, I looked like I was on a self-improvement journey. I became more social, more polite, and worked myself to the bone over assignments. Being perfect became my identity. Only after I was prescribed actual anxiety medications did I have the courage to try to open back up. To allow myself to feel my emotions rather than constantly suppressing them. Feelings I had ignored for years came rushing back all at once, and without a developed support system, I was drowning. There were days in which I could barely leave my room, let alone my house, without triggering horrible panic attacks. A small voice in my mind told me I deserved all the suffering. Deserved every panic attack, every lonely night, every day I went without food. I deserved it for not being perfect, for avoiding my own feelings for so long. To me, it was all my fault, so it was only natural to reap the consequences. College and the freedom it offered were nowhere near an automatic fix. Despite the overwhelming anxiety, though, having emotions made me feel undeniably more alive. For years, I had treated myself like a problem in need of solving, so I chose to study engineering. Engineering allowed me to utilize my focus on machinery and perfectionism into something beneficial for the rest of the world, via industrial machines or even solar-powered automations. I could turn my perfectionism into precision and my constant critiquing into innovation. And while I am still learning how to handle life as a “normal” person, I have grown more comfortable in my own skin and my emotions. On the hard days, I rely on the strong support system I built amongst my new friends and some of my family members. Some days, I still struggle to eat. But eating amongst friends makes it easier. Some days, I still shut down when things feel too big. But I remain patient with myself and allow myself to feel my emotions, no matter how uncomfortable. Some days, I would like nothing more than to never leave my bed and wallow in self-pity over unrequited feelings. But I still force myself to go out and enjoy the day. Healing for me has not been easy; it’s a daily choice to be different, to be better than I was before. Life is messy and so very complicated. But I am finally living it, becoming the person I used to watch with envy. And I would not trade that for anything.

I think teens throughout the world need to be taught about mental health and suicide prevention for one key reason: To show them they are not alone. Perhaps the greatest flaw of the internet is how it is always showing teens everywhere how small they are in the face of such a wide world. Reminding us of the horrors happening outside our closed bedroom doors or constantly showing us people who have "perfect" lives. Everyone is made to feel isolated and hopeless, because the more depressed you feel... the more time you spend glued to your phone desperately clawing for any kind of connection or dopamine. For some people trying to fill the void, buying things is the "solution". All in the hopes that some metal Stanley cup will help us fit in and fix our broken feelings. Because we have to be perfect, just like all the people we see online. But if there is anything I have learned throughout my life... it is that there is no such thing as perfect. Every person in the world has something going on. That celebrity with millions of dollars is still struggling with depression and an anxiety disorder. Yet, social media only encourages them to share their "red carpet" style pictures. Something perfect. For most of my time on this Earth, I have always been seen as the "perfect child" or "perfect student". It became who I was and who I saw myself as. I didn't have an identity beyond that perfection. Other students in my classes would always see that "perfect" version of me in the classroom and simply assumed there was nothing else to me as a person. What they didn't see were my nightly mental breakdowns. The times I was struggling to breathe as anxiety took over, or the times I stayed up until ungodly hours to finish assignments, and never getting the chance to go out with friends. In my mind, if I was not perfect then what was I? While I am incredibly proud to say I no longer struggle with suffocating perfectionism, those years taught me something incredibly important both about myself and about other people. There is always a cause and effect, a reason for how people act, even if I may not be privy to that reason. In our lives, we often only see glimpses of people. For that reason, I believe no one ever knows another person truly. We don't even know ourselves fully! People are simply too complex for that. Nothing happens without reason, because, at our core, humans are just animals reacting to the world around them and doing as they were taught. That person lashing out at the grocery store could have just been fired, or their mom died, or they never had a mom figure in their life at all. I always tread carefully when dealing with other people for that exact reason. You never know what they may be going through. This cause and effect in the world and that I saw in other people was what turned me towards a career in engineering. I became fascinated with physics, a subject that gave me answers to the world around me. In engineering I found a way to manipulate these "causes" to give me a desired effect. It was a way for me to make a difference and help other people. If hatred is taught, perhaps my inventions can teach love, whether that be for other people or the environment. And that is all I could ever ask for.

The 2023-2024 school year was by far the hardest year of my entire life. My anxiety medications were no longer effective, and it was reaching a point where I was having panic attacks every single day. I could barely focus in class, barely eat, and overall struggled to function. To eat anything meant to possibly be “triggering the beast” of my anxiety. It eventually reached a point where I could not go to school. I spent days sitting in my house, unable to leave. Barely even able to leave my room. I constantly lied to my friends and teachers, saying I was sick and not feeling well. Coming into contact with other people all the sudden became overstimulating and overwhelming, as if one wrong question would set me off all over again. For weeks I was barely living, going through the motions to keep myself alive, managing to scarcely keep myself afloat. My parents would eventually take me to a psychiatrist in hopes of getting help. While the experience in itself was nerve wracking, I have yet to ever regret that day or the medication that came with it. Finding the correct medication was a journey in itself, one I still am not finished with, but what I have found has helped me so much. I leapt between doses and types of medications, as well as emergency back up supplies. Eventually... I was finally able to resume a semi-normal life. It is hard to even explain the rush of pride I felt after being able to leave my house again, something other people do every single day without a second thought. I felt proud to be able to eat lunch, at being able to go through a full day of school, and eventually, even face a whole sports season. I could even hang out with friends again. I wish I could say that the medication was some sort of magical pill that fixed me immediately and transformed me into a new, more confident person. The medication set up a foundation, but it was up to me to build myself up from there. I spent the summer constantly pushing myself to try new things and not relax back into my old state of needless comfort. One such project I took upon myself was a school trip to Spain. I was without my parents, without the comfort of a room to myself, and my food options were limited to whatever we could find in the streets that day. Despite everything, I made it through and had a phenomenal time. That summer trip felt like the culmination of all my work, a final sendoff to the old me and the solidification of a new one. A stronger one. A better one.

For the last four years of my life, tennis has held a special place in my heart. For six days a week I had my mind and body pushed to the limits and over the years I’ve learned so much and grown so much that it would be impossible to say I am anywhere near the person I was when I first entered high school. Beyond the simple lesson of the importance of hard work, tennis taught me how to have fun with every challenge in life. Not everything will go your way. Life comes with challenges, that is just the nature of human existence. And for as much as we complain about the problems of life, each one is so incredibly important to our development as people. Without mistakes or struggles, we can never grow. I would never have grown. Most definitely not into the person I am today, to say the very least. Every missed serve led to practicing later and developing my serve into a spinning weapon, and every “out” stroke pushed me to swing harder, faster, and with greater precision. It was a challenge. A game pushing me to get better and build myself up. A loss was not something to spiral into a depression and dwell on, but rather a chance to prove myself again. A chance to find my weaknesses and turn them into strengths, or at the very least find ways to avoid them being exploited to an absurd degree. At the idea of a challenge or a game to test myself, something in me would always burn with excitement. Through tennis, my mental fortitude was tested. But rather than getting frustrated, as a majority of my teammates did, I found pleasure in it. It was something to test myself with. Something to grow with. Something that tested the very limits of my mind and forced me to problem solve around it. I can never thank tennis enough for building myself courage when facing problems, for entirely changing my mindset when it comes to what challenges actually mean in the grand scheme of things. To treat them as hated and disgusted parts of life is to disregard the full extent of the possibilities they bring. Thanks to tennis… nothing I face feels like a worthless endeavor. Everything in some regard is helping me as a person, even if in the moment I can’t see it. Thank you tennis… for the craziest four years of my life and always pushing me to be better than I ever could have imagined.

There are very few movies in my life that have ever made me cry. I’ve made it through all the saddest dying dog, all the sappiest romances, and all hundreds of character deaths movies without a single tear. Yet, some movies over the years have managed to break down my stone walls. One of the more recent ones being Encanto. Each and every character held within them their own story, one that reflected my own personal experiences and even my own fears. Take perhaps the greatest song of the entire film “What Else Can I Do?” sung by the character Isabella, who struggles with an extreme case of perfectionism. Perfectionism was and is something I still fight myself on every single day, so seeing a character confront it head on and find value in herself outside of what others viewed as perfection was incredibly moving. Through mistakes, through pushing the boundaries and experiencing something new, Isabella was able to expand herself as a person as well as her powers. The entire song… Isabella’s progression as a character… it was beautiful. A reminder as to why not everything can be perfect. Because without mistakes, we can never grow. Without the mistakes in MY life, I couldn’t grow. Beyond Isabella, the character of Luisa also embodied my fear of constantly not being strong enough and the intense pressure of being the oldest sibling. Like Luisa, I am the oldest of three siblings. A role that does not come without its own responsibilities, its own weight. And while I have been incredibly fortunate to have parents that take a majority of the burden off of my shoulders, that does not leave me empty handed. I drive around my siblings, help them out with homework, and cook for them whenever my parents are out. Little things tend to add up, especially with me preparing to leave for college while also balancing what is left of my high school experience, ranging from sports to homework. Luisa… she showed me that I was not alone in my struggles. My family watched that movie together and throughout the entire song “Surface Pressure” I was holding back a wave of emotions and tears. I could barely see the scene through my blurry vision. The entire movie felt like a gentle hug from a friend, someone truly “seeing” me… something that is normally very hard for me to find in media. While I could not relate to the family dynamics nor the messages about Hispanic cultures… just the individuals were enough to feel seen. Encanto was truly a lovely movie that I could just watch again and again.

The 2023-2024 school year was by far the hardest year of my entire life. My anxiety medications were no longer effective, and it was reaching a point where I was having panic attacks every single day. I could barely focus in class, barely ate, and overall struggled to function as a normal human being. To eat anything meant to possibly be triggering "the beast” that was my anxiety, as it often left me debilitating nauseous. Weeks went by of constant fear and shaking, and if anything, it worsened... eventually reaching a point where I could not go to school. I spent days sitting in my house, unable to leave, barely even able to convince myself to leave my room. I constantly lied to my friends and teachers, saying I was sick and not feeling well. Coming into contact with other people all the sudden became overstimulating and overwhelming, as if one wrong question would set me off all over again. For weeks I was barely living, going through the motions to keep myself alive, managing to scarcely keep myself afloat. It is hard to even explain the rush of pride I felt after being able to leave my house again. The pride at being able to eat lunch, at being able to go through a full day of school, and eventually, get through a whole sports season of after school games and Saturday tournaments. I could hang out with friends again. It felt like magic. I was a new person. Over the summer, I put that new version of myself to the test, joining a school solo trip to Spain. And I did more than just survive it. I thrived. I was able to live again. People often have a regret, some moment or thing they wish they could go back in time and change. A prospect I have never fully understood. While there were so many horrible parts of my junior year... I wouldn't change it for the world. I needed that moment to help me grow as a person... and it gave me more appreciation for the simple things in life. Every meal I eat feels far more special. Every time I get through the school day I am filled with a sense of fierce pride. Every time I am able to even leave my room feels like such a victory. Although it has been around a year since I went through that experience, the specialty of the world has yet to wear off on me. It is for that very reason that I refuse to succumb to the mass indifference of the world. I cannot and will not simply ignore the state of the world, nor the people in it. If I have the potential to open people's eyes to the incredibly special and fascinating universe we occupy, I have to take it. With a degree in mechanical engineering, I plan to utilize my intelligence and creativity in tandem to actually make that impact on other people and improve their lives. With my technical know-how I could create robots capable of lifting heavy objects for the elderly, make renewable energy sources and machines far more efficient, and create more proficient measuring devices that can measure things as small as quarks. I want to learn all I can about the world, then make it the best place I possibly can, through my creativity. I wish for everyone else in the world to realize how special this place is, and enjoy every moment of their lives. Because... we only live once and... there is so much living to do.