Confidence is an internalized feeling of assuredness and trust within someone's own being and abilities. Confidence can be demonstrated by the way in which people carry themselves, perceive their self-image, their approach to life situations, and their outlook on life in general. Working on my confidence has been a lifelong process. My entire childhood was filled with individuals regularly imposing that I was not pretty, popular, or smart enough. That was during a time that no social media existed. I can only imagine how exacerbated this issue is for children in current times. To combat this issue and work on my confidence, I began to look at the situations and motives of others. I realized that my peers and all of the societal standards expected of girls all had their own motives. Whether it was peers being insecure themselves, or businesses trying to sell beauty and weight loss products, it was all not in my best interests. I disregarded the opinions of others and focused on things that made me happy. Those were things that genuinely made me feel I was being true to myself. I also took every opportunity to better myself within what I found to be important. Using these strategies instilled empathy within me, helped me to enjoy life, encouraged me strive to be my own version of better, and ultimately helped me become more confident. As an adult, I continue this process. I have created boundaries and hold high expectations of those actively involved within my life. I limit my social media usage and remind myself daily of my value. I also participate in new and unfamiliar things to challenge myself. My ability to genuinely be myself, understanding myself, expanding myself, by knowing the things I've overcome all help me grow confidence in myself.

I love nature because it's beautiful, powerful, and the means to my survival. Nature is exactly what it is, no pretense, no motives, just simply itself. Every facet of nature is unique in its own right. It is something that is genuinely taken for granted on a daily basis. I have had the luxury of seeing the nature our world holds within over 12 states and 3 countries. Every place has had something different in regard to nature. Every bit of it was beautiful. Watching the power of nature is bewildering. I've seen storms causing massive waves that crash onto a beach along the coast of California, a tornado ripping through the lands of Kansas, and the forces of hurricanes electrocuting or snapping 60ft tall pine trees in half in North Carolina. I respect nature for both its power and the fact that it is the key to my survival. Without nature, I cannot breathe, drink, eat, or find safety within the shelter of my own home. I appreciate nature in several ways. Not only do I sit within in and truly enjoy it, but I also photograph it and forever capture its beauty. I also find other ways to respect and appreciate it. I recycle or reuse natural materials whenever possible. I find ways to save electricity and conserve water. I create and use compost to enrich the ground. This also limits the amount of waste that I contribute to landfills. Additionally, I have planted flowers, bushes, and trees at every home I have had. I try my hardest to ensure every place I go to is more beautiful when I leave than when I got there. In essence I feel that I am nature, and I should be taking care of it as I would myself.

To keep a growth mindset within my life, I value my mistakes and failures. This concept is deceivingly simple. Generally, I am a bit of a perfectionist. Regardless of what I achieve or the level at which I achieve something, it usually doesn't feel adequate. I set unusually high expectations for myself, my time, and anything I am involved with. This genuinely lends me to being harsh with myself and becoming anxious about the parameters of several aspects of my life. Reminding myself to use a growth mindset helps me relieve this anxiety. When I utterly fail or don't hit my mark, I remind myself that life is a journey. One that is filled with lessons to be learned. It is an adventure of mistakes to be made to ultimately become better. Holding myself to such high standards does result in better standard results, but my growth mindset reminds me that I don't learn from my successes. My mistakes and failures bring excellence, resilience, and growth into my life. For these reasons I treasure my lessons just as much as my successes, if not more so. My growth mindset has helped me be open to trying new things, relieved the anxiety induced by self-expectations, and propelled both my personal and career growth exponentially.

Being impatient is important to me because it is a courtesy I didn't receive growing up. Some concepts are best learned the hard way. I find the lack of patience of others within their interactions with me has changed me and my perspective. I genuinely believe in empathy, and empathy is something you cannot truly possess if you do not understand others. The key to understanding others is patience. No two individuals are the same, and the differences between us can cause misunderstanding, apathy, or conflict. Within the fast-paced nature of modern life, there is little patience given to both ourselves and others. We have access to everything nearly immediately. At times it can be hard to understand that people and our interactions with them are not the same. Having patience is a form of care, for both yourself and others. The ever-increasing pace of society needs more of this. My lack of receiving patience from others, and my desire to genuinely understand and care for others is why being patient is important to me.

My mother, Debbi, was a feisty and unique individual. Though she was extremely flawed, I loved her more than life itself. Her father died when she was one year old, and she was partially raised by a stepfather. She gave birth to me when she was sixteen years old. To say that she grew up fast would be an understatement. In retrospect, this was for the better. She spent the last eight years of her life battling breast cancer. She fought and won her first three bouts with the ugly disease, and ultimately lost after being stage four for a year within her fourth bout. She was forty-six years old when she passed. This event was one of the most defining of all things that I've experienced. To be frank, this says quite a bit. I am thirty-seven years old. I have experienced being raised by young, divorced, and extremely poor parents, was ostracized by student peers because of my looks, consistently being new in areas, and less than desirable social status. I have served the US Air Force, I have sacrificed my dreams and career for the family I started, been a victim of identity fraud on more than one occasion, supported a spouse that came back from overseas with PTSD for years, I have lost two grandparents, a cousin, and an uncle, experienced a divorce, and had medical issues that led to a LEEP procedure, uterine ablation, and then a hysterectomy at the age of twenty-nine. I could write another article to continue this list, but my point is adversity and transition has been my life since day one. My mother was the only component in my life that was consistent, for better or worse, consistent. The day she passed changed me. It was actually a few days after my birthday. It was a Tuesday, and I was dropping my three children off at school and heading to work when I got a call from hospice. When I think about it, I can still feel her cold and soft forehead on my lips from when I kissed her goodbye before she was escorted away to the crematory. Losing her was one of the hardest things I've ever overcome. I was devastated and nearly in denial when it happened. For months, I would get off work, drive down the street and pull into my mother's driveway. It would take me a few minutes to realize she wasn't there, and I would cry. It took me several more months to come to terms with her departure, but her life and her passing taught me several things. I watched her relentlessly fight, day in and day out, maintaining an optimistic and obstinate attitude. When she passed, it made me realize that time is a gift; one that is worth fighting for. Of all the resources we have, it is one of only a few that we cannot get back once spent. Her passing put my life into perspective. It became explicitly clear to me that my life was not what I wanted it to be. I was not what I wanted to be. The world was not what I wanted it to be. Generally speaking, I've been the peacekeeper within my work, extremely small social circle, and family. After my mother's passing, I began fighting for my time. I no longer let others take advantage of my kindness and started to make moves for myself. I created boundaries I never knew I needed. I too have always been a fighter, but after this event, my life became clearer to me. I looked at my family tree and realized over a third of the women get breast cancer, and there have been a few that have passed from this. My mother passing at such a young age made me realize that I needed to change my life. I realized that I may not have much time on this earth either. How do you want to spend your last ten years, Jeana? Since my mother's passing, I have fought for finding myself. I have spent time reflecting and realizing who I am and what is important to me. I have spent my life bettering myself, focusing on my children and career, and have been helping and taking care of others. Overall, the death of my mother sharpened my perspective and encouraged me to fight for what I want and who I am. I want to sit on my deathbed knowing that I did the things that mattered, I was the best version of who I was meant to be and made an impact on the world around me for the better. To this day, I still and always will remember this lesson and use it to fight within my war against time.

Referee of Chaos The last two years have been quite interesting due to the effects of Covid-19. During this process, my life has been quite different. There was a period that both my career and household changed tremendously. A few of my coworkers and myself were called upon by my job to learn a second job to better serve the state of Kansas. We worked on this project for approximately one year, it was something new to us and we worked long hours. While this was happening, we observed all the changes that were happening in the outside world. The biggest local issue faced was the availability of food. Meat in our local area was sparse. Grocery stores would receive a new shipment every week and supplies were sold out quickly. A good portion of this was due to citizen’s panic buying. One of my coworkers had noted one day that both the price of meat increasing, and the unavailability of meat had made it impossible to buy meat for her household during the last few weeks. She said she was critically low and that her daughter was having the same issue. By happenstance, we were having this conversation outside while on one of our breaks. One of the supervisors of the new project had joined us. She chimed in and said this was an issue for her as well. As we sat and chatted about everything, my mind pondered the events of everything before the pandemic. Six months before Covid-19 happened, I finally saved enough money to buy a cow. I bought the cow from a local farmer and had it butchered. So, by the time me and these women were having the conversation, I had an entire stand-up deep freezer full of vacuum sealed beef. Due to my lower level pay and me having three teenagers to feed, I keep a pantry of food and a deep freezer full in the event I'm not able to afford food at any point in the year that unexpected expenses arise. I knew both women, and the one coworker’s daughter. She was almost my age and had two small children. These people were good, hardworking people. It made me sad that they were experiencing such problems for something as basic and necessary for survival. I had to help them. The next day I brought in over 80 pounds of hamburger meat and a few roasts to work. This was split between the three women and taken home to feed their families. They were very appreciative of this food. My ability to help felt amazing. This act of kindness strengthened the relationships with those I work with. Although this had an impact on me and my work life, the biggest impact was reaffirming to me that I can truly help. On an average basis I contribute to causes whenever I can. I’ve found that I can’t help as much as I’d like, due to my schedule and moderately low salary. This makes me feel my contributions are never enough and are too small to contribute. Having the ability to help these women showed me that my contributions are genuinely needed and have a huge impact on other people’s lives. Not only did my stepping up make me feel great, but it also encouraged me to understand my contributions do matter. This has pushed me to continue contributing every way I can, regardless how small the contribution may be. Like the man in my photograph, I'm not the main attraction of the show, but my role in the game saves lives.

One practical solution for helping more people who struggle with mental health would be to work on the scope in which insurance companies serve these individuals. I genuinely believe that the best help people can receive is receiving quality care from therapy. The issue with affected individuals receiving proper care is within the insurance industries coverage of this care. Compared to other medical necessities, mental health providers are five times more likely to have a smaller number of "in-network" providers than regular medical care providers. Along with this, there are fewer providers in general and the therapists are less likely to be encouraged to accept insurance companies when the services are covered, due to not getting paid enough by the insurance companies. To make matters worse, people who struggle with mental health issues face unreasonable criteria to qualify for coverage through insurance companies. The pure fact that mentally affected people are required to jump through hoops and only certain severity levels of mental illness is covered means that the insurance industry is essentially both not properly serving the needs of their consumers and are undermining mental health in general. These factors are an additional stress for people who suffer from mental health issues. This added stress of financial burden, feeling like their conditions are being undermined, and having limited resources for addressing their mental health needs only compounds the patient's current issue. This added stress is both unhealthy, and unethical on the insurance provider's side. The increase in number of people suffering from mental health issues in recent years highlights the importance of this problem. Though this solution is grand in scale, I believe a reform within the insurance industry would be the most practical solution to genuinely helping those affected by mental health issues.

I practice self-care by indulging in my hobbies and dying my own hair. I live a fast-paced life that is full of activities. I consistently have somewhere to be or have something I need to get done. Though I genuinely enjoy being productive, doing the same activities repetitively as a lifestyle can be exhausting. I am a single mom of three teenage children, work full time, have an hour commute, pursue my bachelor's degree full time, and take care of my pets and household. Falling prey to burnout is a real possibility for anyone that has a schedule that is busy as mine. I use self-care to avoid burnout and lessen anxiety. Taking time for myself to enjoy photography, physical fitness, reading, gardening, crafts, and dying my hair helps me to relax. All of these activities are a break in the monotony of my day-to-day life. The fact that I have many hobby interests also keeps my tiny amount of self-care time varied as well. Allotting this time to myself recharges my metaphorical batteries. I have found that participating in my hobbies has enabled lower stress levels, sleeping better, and feeling more positive about my life. This has a major impact on my life. I am more rested, able to focus, be more optimistic, and sincerely enjoy all things that I do. I believe my practices of self-care have enabled me to be more productive at work, be a better parent, and focus more acutely on my university studies. Overall, self-care not only prevents me from experiencing burn out, but it also enhances every area of my life.

One way I try to have a positive impact on the world is by me genuinely being myself. This sounds astoundingly simple. In my experience, this concept reaches far beyond face value. Being myself makes an impact on the world by both showing those around me it is okay to do so, and by setting an amazing example for those around me. During my travels to over 12 states and 4 countries, I have met many people from a vast number of backgrounds. One thing they all have in common is that there are large populations of people that feel pressured to be a certain way. My insistence on being true to myself and only being myself has given perspective to those around me and encouraged them to do the same. In a way, this is also a way of setting strong examples for others. I believe I'm an amazing example by being myself because of my personality and my actions. I'm extremely motivated, optimistic, compassionate, often help others, believe in hard work, practice extreme integrity, love learning, and encourage everyone to chase their dreams. My practicing these things in my day to day is a part of who I am. Other people seeing me doing the things I do often inspires them to do the same. Because of this, I have seen people start taking walks around my town together, donate to homeless shelters and Planet Aid, dedicate more time to their children, start to read career development books, picked up photography as a stress relieving hobby, seen more value within themselves, learned how to sew, created boundaries with negative influences in their lives, and much more. I sincerely believe me being myself has advanced the betterment of all those around me and makes a tremendous impact.

If I were a highly influential figure, the main thing I would stand for is higher moral values. By this I mean I would stand for people having pride in themselves, fostering self-confidence, high levels of integrity, solid work ethics, and a greater sense of obligation to help those around them. Though our current world is full of technologies never dreamed of in prior decades, technology has had some negative side effects within society. I truly believe the easy access of information we once craved is now hindering humankind. Technology and the internet have helped humanity advance highly in many sectors. But a good portion of society has become entirely too dependent on it. Additionally, it has had a huge impact on our attention spans and how we communicate, and not necessarily for the better. It sounds slightly hypocritical to be an influencer that would have this perspective, but I would certainly put it to good use. I would encourage people to make good use of our new technologies. I would inspire my followers to engage in learning, volunteering, and practices of self-betterment. I wouldn't be starting trends of eating Tide Pods or slapping teachers. I would find fun and creative ways to encourage my followers to think for themselves, and practice humility. I would motivate them to go after their goals and passions in life. Most importantly, I would promote the idea that we as humans are bonded with one another. Everything we do affects those around us, we should do everything in our power to lift each other up and advance our society as a whole. Ultimately, I would stand for advancing our society to a place we've never been, a place that we have access to unimaginable technology, superior values, and extraordinary sense of community.

My dream life isn't exactly extravagant, but it would be filled with meaning. I would be alive and have the ability to genuinely be there for my children when they need me. This is a luxury my mother wasn't blessed with. I would also have my master's degree in human resources management and be in a human resources director position within the government sector. During my summers I would make trips around the country and other nations helping people and pursuing my love of photography at the same time. I would live in a spacious log home in a rural area on 15 acres. We most certainly can't forget the wrap around porch on my home and the large pond on this plot. Any of my free time would be spent fishing and enjoying the quiet, reading books in my porch hammock. The acreage would enable me to raise a few cows and continue my practices of growing a good portion of my own food. My children would all be grown and graduated from college. My oldest son would be a psychiatrist and my daughter would be a veterinarian, like they are aspiring to currently. My youngest son would be a social media personality and all three of them would be thoroughly enjoying their health, careers, and lives. To me, this imagined life would be paradise. I am praying that with hard work and extreme dedication, one day this will all be my reality.

One of the things I love most about myself is my level of resiliency. Since being born to extremely young teenage parents, my life has been fraught with instability and adversity. I learned quickly to adapt to my environments and situations. Regardless of the challenges that are thrown my way, I adapt, survive, and at times even thrive. All my life challenges have shaped me into the strong woman I am today. I can have what others would consider to be nothing and will turn it into everything I need. I have seen over 12 states and 4 countries, I have met many wonderful people. In that process I have realized the exaggeratedness of turmoil and adversity my life possesses compared to others. The mere fact that I have survived, truly loved myself and others, and have been able to fully appreciate the life I've been given is a miracle. This is all thanks to my resiliency. My resiliency is my biggest asset in life and helps me approach every situation with a smile and an open mind. It is my most loved self-attribute because it has been a marker that has defined the entire outcome of every challenge I've faced. Without it, I would be a different person and in a much worse position in life. I am extremely grateful for my resiliency that was earned while bouncing back from the many harsh life lessons I've learned. Beyond my integrity, and humility, my resiliency is also the part of myself that I respect the most. This is why it is my most revered attribute.

Optimism has helped me overcome vast life challenges. I grew up impoverished, experienced my parent’s nasty divorce, moved several times between three states, was bullied at schools, had hardly any friends, and had a stepdad that treated me poorly. I moved out at 18 years old and was excited to have a different life. Since then, my efforts have been met with sheer adversity. I’ve experienced stresses of raising children, endured effects of a husband’s post war PTSD, experienced getting divorced, supporting my mother during four breast cancer bouts, the crushing weight of my home foreclosing, watching my mother die from cancer at the age of 46, losing both maternal grandparents, and my medical issues resulting in a uterine ablation, followed by a hysterectomy at twenty-nine years old. Experiencing these hardships changed my life and has shaped who I am. Optimism was the key to handling all situations with grace. I’d love to claim this as a personal choice, but that’s not the case. Experiencing each childhood challenge left me no choice but to be optimistic, because I had no control in my life situations. Being optimistic in those times kept me whole and hopeful that things would get better. I am thankful for this. The gravity of my adult hardships feels much greater, like the universe is attempting to suck me back into the ground from where I came. My optimism has always kept me marching forward. It has encouraged me to continue. I tell myself; you’ve climbed the mountains alone and survived, you will certainly overcome whatever challenge is next. Optimism and its effects on my life have taught me no challenge is too great, and to always push forward, as there is no way to succeed if you allow the adversities of life to stop you.

I would like to be awarded the Tyde Memorial Scholarship because it will help me in pursuing my dreams of becoming a Human Resources Director. If I am awarded this scholarship, the funds will go towards completing my bachelor’s degree in Human Resources and Organizational Leadership. Over the last five years, it has become explicitly clear that getting my degree will be one of my largest life goals completed. Further, I have realized that I cannot advance within my career without it. This is important to me because I wish to advance in my career until retirement age, not simply be comfortable and enjoy my position. My new degree will afford myself career development opportunities, new learning experiences, better pay, and will put me in a better position to help others. I would have the capability to help all levels of humanity around me with project implementation for local causes that I could get my organization involved in. My new position would also afford me a higher level of disposable income that I could contribute further to causes on my own time. Helping others fulfils me, it is my main personal goal in life, aside from raising my children to outstanding adults. Being awarded this scholarship will also impact my future much farther than getting my degree and obtaining my dream position. It will have immense impact on my finances. This scholarship will assist me in requiring less student loans for me to pay back after graduation. This sounds simple, but its gravity extends far beyond face value. I’m a single mom to three teenage children. Between working full time, attending university full time, an hour commute, and caring for my children, I live a life that leads to extremely stressful situations. My finances are already a cause of stress, the added cost of college education has compounded stress in my daily life. In addition, all three of my children will be admitting to universities within the next four years. Considering I am ultimately undertaking a master’s degree after attaining my bachelors, there will be a two to three-year span that at least three of four household members will be attending universities simultaneously. This scholarship would be my first step to becoming less stressed about my education’s price tag and enable me to focus more on my courses, degree, and family. This scholarship has the ability to change my life for the better in ways that mere words cannot describe.

To me, being independent ultimately means you are free. This independence is the ability to discover and exist in truest form of yourself. The ability to do things you want and in your own time. The barriers of mainstream thinking of others isn't considered. Your only limitations are how you see yourself, your decisions, motivations, and feelings. Being independent is achieved by looking within and using introspection to realize your true self. I have extreme levels of independence. Like others, my truest form of self is vastly complex; but in defining my own limitations I've experienced the most extreme and rare feelings of independence. It's essentially setting boundaries for other people, their roles in your head space and life, and the ideas that are fed to us by society daily. True independence is cutting strings attached to you due to not having boundaries in these areas. Once cut, it's a feeling anything is possible, and I can accomplish all that I wish. This has impacted my life deeply. In my 37 years, I've sincerely taken stock with introspection and realized who I truly am. This independence has made me proud of who I've become and has pushed me to be nothing but true to myself. I feel this wholly, any time I'm not aligned with my true self, I feel I'm lying to myself and others. This pride and motivation are things that can never be taken away. The impact of my being independent has forced me to look at society, and its views and expectations a different way. I see all sides of any argument and I don't merely skim the surface of anything. It impacts me by driving me to find meaning and value within every situation or person within my life. I forever evolve within my independence.

One experience that has shaped a part of who I am today is my mother dying. My mother passed away from a fourth bout with Breast Cancer. Assisting her in her battles with cancer multiple times, spanning over a course of years was only the start. My shaving my head in solidarity and the adversity I experienced consequently would inevitably be dwarfed by her passing. My mother's passing at the age of forty-six not only cut a piece of me to forever be missing, but it also made me realize the preciousness of time. The US Air Force taught me good time management. But my mother passing made me genuinely understand the importance of valuing time itself on a level deeper than anything I've ever experienced. This encouraged me to not waste my time. Stop wasting time on people who didn't have my best interests at heart. I created boundaries I never knew I would need. Stop wasting time by motivating me to be better at all aspects of life. Since my mother's death, I have focused on all areas of my life that need improving and continue to do so. I was internally forced to look at life from a perspective that passing early may also prove to be my situation. I asked myself "Have you finished what you want finished?", "Are your children prepared if you die in the next 10-15 years?", "What's being left on life's table?". I became a better parent, I excelled in my career, and have experienced personal growth unimaginable for most humans my age. I truly know who I am by looking at my life through the lens of my mother's fate. Although I will miss her greatly, I am forever grateful for the perspective this obstacle has given me.

Being a single parent has shaped my educational journey immensely. My journey started in 2010. I attended Washburn University for two years. I was a single parent and worked as a Pharmacy Technician; its flexible schedule afforded me the ability to attend on campus full-time courses, while working full-time and taking care of my children. To say I was busy would be an understatement. With my schedule, I had no opportunity to foster friendships, romantic relationships, and quite frankly I rarely received a good night's sleep either. After two years of studies, work cut my hours and I began to sink financially. My mother’s Breast Cancer also advanced to Stage four. My career not supplying enough income to support my three children and my mother’s health conditions requiring more time led me to drop out. Not only did being a single parent stress the point of how important getting my degree was, but it also strained me financially, emotionally, and took tolls on my health. I was broke, felt like I failed my children, and was utterly exhausted. This wasn’t including the tolls my mother’s Cancer was taking on my finances, schedule, and mental stability. After dropping out, I obtained a much better job with standard hours, and was able to better take care of my children and dying mother. She passed away over a year later. The career I began back then is the one I still hold. I ‘m still a single parent, and my children are now teenagers. I have recently peaked in my career and realized I cannot advance further until I get my degree. My life is still busy with my children being in forensics, basketball, track, completing driver’s educations, and every activity you could imagine. Between my children’s schedule, my full-time career and hour commute each way, my day life is spent. I am still determined to get my degree, so I enrolled in an online four-year college. Being a single parent has dictated most of my time and finances. This has shaped my education by limiting the type of college I can attend. With my children only a few years away from needing to further their own educations, it has limited my budget. All of this has pushed me to be resourceful as possible and stressed the importance of my children sharing this experience with me. Going back to school as a single parent has absorbed all my free time and is giving me student loan debt. But it’s also giving me experiences to share with my children, making a strong example for them, and enabling the accomplishment of my dreams. The education experience as a single parent is extremely difficult, but within this journey I’ve learned lessons far beyond course material. After obtaining my degree, my better position will enable me to give more back to my community. My higher rate of pay will lend the ability to have more disposable income to contribute to my philanthropic interests. I have participated in or contributed to countless causes. Most recently, the organizations I work for has organized different donation drives for each month of the year. After graduating, I plan to organize and implement more programs like this within any new organization I work for. My current major is Human Resources and Organizational leadership. This new career field will assist in both helping those within my community’s workforce and will put me in excellent positions to instill programs and organize events like this to further assist and serve my community. I cannot begin to express my level of excitement for these upcoming opportunities.

My goal in life is to genuinely help others. This goal aligns with my passions in life. I plan on achieving my life goal by achieving my educational goals of completing my bachelor’s degree in Human Resources and Organizational Management and pursuing a master’s degree in Human Resources Management afterwards. Accomplishing these goals will enable me to embark on a new adventure within my career and afford me vast opportunities to advance within my career. Not only this, but it will also help me to fulfil my passions of helping others. I’ve been told by my childhood mentors that I should seek my passions and try to incorporate that into a career. From the beginning, this is what I have done. I served the US Air Force, I protected others. I became a Pharmacy Technician, I assisted others in overcoming health issues. Nine years ago, I began my current occupation, I obtained a position with Kansas Department of Labor, within the Industrial Safety and Health division. I am administrative personnel for a program that keeps workers safe from occupational hazards by conducting safety and health inspections on public and state entities. Every position I’ve held assisted in the wellbeing of others. The position I will be awarded after achieving my degree will be no different. Achieving my educational goals to enable my life goals is important to me because I both know what it is like to not feel smart and accomplished and know how it feels to be underprivileged and impoverished. My childhood was long and had an overwhelming theme of adversity. I was born to fifteen- and sixteen-year-old parents. I later experienced their unpleasant divorce. I experienced living alone with a single mother that was hardly around, due to her long work hours and terrible dating habits. The financial instability of my home, that changed more than once every year, taught me more empathy, gratitude, and adaptability than any book ever could. I am grateful for my experiences. Due to the many challenges I have faced, both in my childhood and my young adult life, I have always felt a need to look after and care for others, especially those truly in need. My being a part of the betterment of others fulfils me. Accomplishing my educational goals will assist me in attaining a Human Resources Management position. Not only is this my dream position, due to a better ability for provide for my teenage children, but it also puts me in a prime position to make the most difference. Obtaining my dream position will place me in a position to get creative with ideas that will help the community around me with efforts from my organization. I will be able to assist the local workforce with my knowledge and passion, and I’ll have the ability to assist the local community around me with organized events. Having the ability to help every level of humanity around me is something I would consider both a life and career achievement. Along with the widened options of helping others through my position, I would have disposable income to further contribute to all causes I wish to support that I cannot through the organization. All around, my getting my degrees will assist me with getting my dream career. This will earn me better pay to support my children and philanthropic interests and give me a higher ability to fulfil my passion and lifelong goal of helping every level of humanity around me.

Staying true to myself has become quite easy over time due to my obstinance. Some may perceive my level of stubbornness to be a negative aspect of my personality. However, I disagree, obviously. I stay true to myself in my daily life by spending time when I wake to reflect on my life. I look at the choices I have made and their outcomes. I review the largest obstacles in my life and how I overcame them, despite any anxiety I had at the time. Doing so reaffirms what my values are to myself at the deepest level and basing them on my actions instead of my self-perceived image. Every day I have come to the same conclusion; I am resilient, empathetic, hard-working, stubborn, efficient, motivated, possess extreme integrity, and loyal nearly to a fault. All these values do not allow me to be anything that I am not. Hence my consistently coming to the same conclusion. The levels of hardship I have experienced in life to acquire these values has demonstrated explicitly that life is too short and precious to waste something as valuable as time being anything other than my true self. Frequently using this internal check to ensure my actions are aligning with my values helps me stay true to myself. Being myself fills me with pride and lends me to being an example for others to include my teenage children, encouraging them to do the same. This pride and pressure to be an exemplary role model further motivates me to stay true to myself. I place value in this responsibility and hope that my children will one day take pride in this as well.

I practice bravery by living the life I live and have adopted bravery within it due to necessity. Seventeen years ago, I served the US Air Force and married an airman. Three children and a seeming lifetime later, we chose to settle in Kansas. Kansas is my then husband’s home state, I’m from the North Carolina coast. Regardless of that marriage ending years ago, I’ve remained in Kansas. I’ve been stationary to provide my children with a sense of stability that I never had. I practice bravery daily by living somewhere over 1250 miles away from my family and having no support system in the process. I both work and attend university full time, have an hour commute, care for my teenage children within 50/50 custody, care for family pets, and maintain my household. I accomplish this alone, with a single modest income. Living life with that level of independence while children depend on you is a life of bravery itself. By reflecting on vast challenges I’ve overcome, due to this bravery, it encourages me to continue. I live boldly by accomplishing these aspects of life and striving to be an exceptional version of myself. Beyond all things required of me, I find ways to better myself and my community. Last year I succeeded in a fitness journey, I lost fifty pounds. In the last month I donated three bags of clothing to Goodwill and Planet Aid, involving several coworkers increased that number four-fold, and I read twenty-three books. In the last two weeks I’ve written twenty-nine essays to apply for sixty-two scholarships and successfully tested out of a university course to save time and money. Through all these things, I believe I practice bravery and live life boldly every day in my amazing life journey.

I believe that every human being has value and is capable of great things, even though we all are unique creatures and experience different life journeys. Unfortunately, not all people have the confidence to see this value within themselves. This concept is a sad truth that compels me to make a difference. I encourage this within people by simply being myself. Understanding the hardship’s life has to offer, I often smile at strangers, hold open doors, and show courtesy to all. Small acts of kindness encourage people to see hope for humanity. This alone can encourage others to do the same and have an optimistic view of the world they inhabit. Another way I encourage others is by simply listening. This sounds small in scope, but it has a larger scale impact. Often people feel unheard or just need someone to talk to. For all those around me, I’m a sounding board and people can confide without fear of judgement. This encourages people’s mental state being healthier. Lastly, I lead by example and encourage people to join me. Most recently, I began three-mile walks around my neighborhood every day. Local women taking notice stopped me one afternoon to conversate. I mentioned my walks have made a big difference and offered them to join me. Within two weeks there were four different women either taking their own walks or joining me in mine. Another recent event was taking used clothes to Goodwill and Planet Aid for donation. I emailed coworkers letting them know I would be happy to take anything they had. Multiple people brought garbage bags of items for donation the next day. My taking walks and donating encouraged others to better themselves or contribute to good causes by me simply living my life and trying to include others.

The most helpful piece of financial advice I have ever received was to be hyper vigilant with protecting my identity. This advice was proved to be true to me from a very young age. My mother stole my identity and used it to rack up credit card debt and residential utility bills from my ages of twelve to twenty-nine before she passed away. The years following that I experienced online perpetrators stealing my identity that used my bank information to drain my bank account on two different occasions. The fact that this happened despite my tactics to prevent these occurrences shows me that I would have been much worse off if I hadn’t been vigilant. Some examples of my tactics were changing my passwords on a regular basis and making them complicated, when I would sign credit card receipts, I would sign them with my maiden name that was differing from the listed card information, and while getting gas I would make my purchase prices mirrored numbers; The mirrored numbers would be purchase prices of $25.52 or $31.13 for example. Using these tactics helped prevent identity theft and assisted me in identifying charges that weren’t mine. Living in a hard economy and a world that has become more dependent on digital technology makes our society vulnerable to these violations. Though I couldn’t protect myself in the early stages of my life, I have taken this helpful advice with the upmost importance. I have learned this priceless advice is more pertinent than ever.

I am currently a single parent of three teenagers. I both work and attend college on a full-time basis. Along with this I have an hour commute and actively engage in my children’s vast amounts of activities and the chauffeuring that is involved with all of them. Between my work, school, commute, and supporting my children’s activities, to say my life is chaos is an understatement. To help reduce my levels of stress and take care of my mental health, I pursue relaxation by participating in my many hobbies. Normally, I will combine a few of my hobbies together to form one activity. This makes me feel as though I’m still being productive. Quite honestly, it makes me feel better about using time for myself and increases my enjoyment of the experience as well. My favorite combination of hobbies is taking three-mile walks, while listening to my favorite music or audiobooks and taking photographs along the way. I have found taking these walks has helped me destress and maintain proper mental health. Though doing multiple activities at one time sounds less relaxing to some, for me it is the best feeling in the world. I have captured some of my most prized photographs while on these walks. I have had time to sort all my thoughts; this is essential because I have many. I often feel like my brain never slows down. The fact that I get to practice photography, get to learn new things while also making strides towards maintaining my physical health is amazing. For all these reasons, I participate in my hobbies to truly relax, organize my thoughts and feelings, destress, and ultimately give my mental health the gentle care that is much needed.

My life is one that is chaotic and fast moving. I’m a single parent that is currently both working and attending college full time. I have three teenage children and an hour commute. Between my work, school, commute, and supporting my children’s activities, to say that I have a hectic life would be an understatement. I truly believe my hobbies have prevented my experiencing burn out. My hobbies include participating in physical fitness, gardening, photography, reading, writing, and personal/career development. Within the last year, my hobbies have not only helped me achieve a solid work life balance but have also enabled me to accomplish some amazing goals. Due to these hobbies, I have lost fifty pounds, created and reaped the fruits of my labor in a 25X75 foot garden, read twenty-three books, created a 24X36 framed collage work in memorial of my deceased mother, and applied to over fifty scholarships to assist my impending debt and exercise my love for writing at the same time. My hobbies both reduced my levels of stress and fulfilled my passions in life. Furthermore, they drove me to accomplish goals I didn’t realize I had. I truly feel blessed having the ability to participate in such rewarding activities.

The duration of my life has been filled with adversity and outright oppression. I faced psychological abuse and quite honestly experienced hardships at a level of those twice my age. Though everything I’ve faced in life has shattered me, I have learned several things while piecing myself back together. To be sincere, my lessons learned have been ones you will not find in any textbook. The most crucial of these lessons is regarding how I was treated. I have spent many years in reflection pondering why I was treated those ways, what about those ways I didn’t like, and why I didn’t like them. This has etched empathy within the soul of my being. Understanding how hard life can be and what it can do to people elevates my level of compassion exponentially. Approaching people and situations in my life remembering all the lessons I’ve learned has enabled my sight to see far beyond the aesthetics of every situation. It beckons me view all sides of a situation and lends an affinity to all those involved. My heightened understanding of people, life, and the human condition pushes me to move through life empathetically to all. I loathe the hardships my life has presented, but the fact that they instilled empathy within my core has me eternally grateful.

Generosity is offering everything within your capability for the betterment of those in need around you. I believe at the heart of generosity is empathy. Caring enough about those around you to observe and truly listen to them both leads to understanding them and their situation and is a gift itself. We may not have the ability to solve their every issue, but we are all capable of providing someone that sincerely understands them. This alone can be enough to make a significant difference to someone that is going through difficult times. The ability to empathize with others better helps cultivate the most effective ways to make a difference in their lives as well. This makes contributing more than a lending ear far more possible. I believe the most significant kind of generosity requires sacrifice. Though it isn’t necessarily grand in scope, this investment is extremely meaningful and has a massive impact. True generosity requires that we look beyond ourselves and put the needs of others at the forefront. At times, this requires us to put other’s needs above our own. Our ability to do this is a reminder of how strongly we are all connected. As humankind, we are one. I believe genuine generosity is the ability to foster this connection. Through acts of empathy, kindness, and sacrifice, we invest in each other. This strengthens our lives and the bond we share as people. Through generosity, we are a better society and unified as humankind.

My name is Jeana Payne, I am thirty-seven years old and would say that if my life were to be a book, it would be titled “Adversity be Thy Name”. I was born unto two extremely young teenage parents in North Carolina. I grew up impoverished with my mother, after my parents divorced when I was ten years old. I was poor, looked like a boy, was consistently the new kid within areas, and left alone to take care of myself often. She later married a man that was selfish and arrogant. He played favorites with his children and even though I overachieved, I couldn’t do anything right. I was bullied by my peers and consequently strived to be the best from a young age due to all these things. Although I persisted, life has a way of consistently changing your plans. I served in the US Air Force, married a fellow Airman, and had three children early in life. After a second tour in Iraq, my then husband returned with PTSD and developed drinking problems. Several years later I experienced divorce. I attended Washburn University for a semester over two years and ultimately dropped out due to financial reasons and needing to help take care of my mother. She was experiencing her fourth bout with Breast Cancer and had just turned stage four. She passed away a little over a year later, at the age of forty-six. I have spent over the last five years yet again being a single parent and my children are now teenagers. I currently have a state government job and have recently peaked within my position. I have realized that I must complete my degree to enable myself a new career and advancement opportunities. I am pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Human Resources and Organizational Leadership. Afterwards, I will be pursuing my Master’s in the same major. In the process of choosing which degree to pursue; I took an introspective look at my life and career choices. I asked myself what my passions are and what my life purpose is. I realized that every fulfilling experience I had was ones that I was both pushing myself to my full potential and was helping and/or caring for others. this made a lot of sense. I served the military, served as a licensed Pharmacy Technician, and worked with state government to protect public and state employees from occupational hazards. All my longest standing career choices were ones that involved the welfare or betterment of others. This is my main reason for choosing the degree path that I am currently on. Yes, the prestige of holding a position of this status, and me being able to pay for my three teenagers college educations would be life changing! But starting a Human Resources and Organizational Leadership related career would more importantly assist me in fulfilling my passions and life in life. Optimally, I would gain a position as a Human Resources Director. This position would enable me to help both my community workforce and my employer organization. This career would also put me into a prime position to initiate, organize, and execute charity work within my organization. I would possess the position and influence to implement organization wide charity events. Both my ability to be involved with this and having the ability to influence others to do so on a larger scale is a concept that I find highly exciting. Having the ability to help my organization, its employees, and the community that surrounds it is a status of accomplishment that would be a lifelong achievement. One that both fulfills me, brings me to my fullest potential, and helps every level of humanity around me.

My world as I see it- Jeana Payne On an average case basis, I have ten hobbies I regularly participate in. Though I thoroughly enjoy them all, Photography is my second longest standing and most cherished of all hobbies. Not only is it a therapeutic activity for me and my fast paced and stressful life, but it also symbolizes more than most realize. My first camera was a rectangular compact 110-film camera. It was bought for me at a flea market by my only childhood friend’s parents when I was twelve years old. Growing up, my parents were divorced, and I primarily lived with my mother. She was extremely poor and usually could not afford to buy the few things I wanted. This gift was on a whim and the very first gift I received from someone outside my family. The fact that it came from my only friend’s parents made it extremely special. From that point I was hooked. There was something so exciting and oddly familiar about capturing photos. After graduating high school, I joined the US Air Force. I enlisted in the small chance that I could be assigned as a desert photographer. Unfortunately, I didn’t receive this occupation, due to it being an extremely small career field. However, I did learn within my entry processing that I have no depth perception. This made complete sense! Photography was comforting and oddly familiar to me because exactly what I saw within my camera lens, was exactly what I was seeing with my eyes in my real world. When looking at photographs, it is a snapshot of my experience in the most literal way. This has always been amazing to me, but there is yet another reason photography and the photos I shoot are significant to me. Not only has my memory not always been great, but my life has been a lightning rod of adversity and adaptations. Since I was ten years old, I have moved countless times. Between my mother being financially unstable, me being in the military, and all situations life has served me, I have visited or lived in fifteen states and four countries. I have had differing occupations, been a part of a vast number of communities, and have experienced more than most within thirty-seven years of life. Photography and the photographs that are captured within it, have both become a part of my identity, and helps me remember all that I eventually forget. They are glimpses into my past, all that I have faced, embraced, and overcome. They serve as a connection to all that I have lost as well, to include my deceased mother, grandmother, grandfather, uncle, and cousin. Photography is not merely a hobby for me. It is my therapy, reaffirmation of my ability to continue overcoming life challenges, a connection to all that I have lost, and is a physical representation of my life as I literally see it. To me photographs symbolize life and life is photography.

Being a single parent has shaped my educational journey immensely. My journey started in 2010. I attended Washburn University for two years. I was a single parent and worked as a Pharmacy Technician; its flexible schedule afforded me the ability to attend on campus full time courses, while working full-time and taking care of my children. To say I was busy would be an understatement. With my schedule, I had no opportunity to foster friendships, romantic relationships, and quite frankly I rarely received a good night's sleep either. After two years of studies, my work cut my hours and I began to sink financially. My mother’s Breast Cancer also advanced to Stage four. My career not supplying me with enough income to support my three children and my mother’s health conditions requiring more time led me to drop out. Not only did being a single parent stress the point of how important getting my degree was, it also strained me financially, emotionally, and took tolls on my health. I was broke, felt like I had failed my children, and was utterly exhausted. This wasn’t including the tolls my mother’s Cancer was taking on my finances, schedule, and mental stability. After dropping out, I obtained a much better job with standard hours, and was able to better take care of my children and dying mother. She passed away a little over a year later. The career I began back then is the one I still hold. I am still a single parent, and my children are now teenagers. I have recently peaked in my career and realized I cannot advance further until I get my degree. My life is still busy with my children being in forensics, basketball, track, completing driver’s educations, and every activity you could imagine. Between my children’s schedule, my full-time career and hour commute each way, my day life is spent. I am still determined to get my degree, so I enrolled in an online four-year college. Being a single parent has dictated most of my time and finances. This has shaped my education by limiting the type of college I can attend. With my children only a few short years away from needing to further their own education, it has limited my budget. All of this has pushed me to be as resourceful as possible and stressed the importance of my children sharing this experience with me. Going back to school as a single parent has absorbed all my free time and is giving me student loan debt. But it’s also giving me experiences to share with my children, making a strong example for them, and enabling the accomplishment of my dreams. The education experience as a single parent is extremely difficult, but within this journey I’ve learned lessons far beyond course material. After obtaining my degree, I’ll be in a better position to give back to my community. Since becoming an adult, I have participated in or contributed to countless causes. Most recently, the organizations I work for has organized different donation drives for each month of the year. After graduating, I plan to organize and implement more programs like this within any new organization I work for. My current major is Human Resources and Organizational leadership. A new career in this field will not only assist me in helping those within my community’s workforce, but it will also put me in an excellent position to instill programs and organize events like this to further assist and serve my community. I cannot begin to express my level of excitement for these upcoming opportunities.

I genuinely believe that the most important financial life lesson is being vigilant in protecting your identity. Protecting your identity can be the difference between financial success or ruin. From the ages of eighteen to twenty-nine I learned this the hard way. I spent the better part of eleven years being a metaphorical cleaning crew, polishing away the financial mess identity fraud caused me. I learned about credit cards, credit card debt, statutes of limitations on various things, and Credit scores. I was schooled on how all these things affect your credit score and ability to succeed in life. To add additional lessons to be learned, all the fraud incidents were created by my mother. She had used my name and information to create numerous delinquent accounts over the years. This taught me the importance of privacy and being actively involved with checking my credit health on a regular basis. I loved my mother dearly, but those incidents wrecked and financially terrorized my entire young adulthood. My mother passed away in 2013, but I have to say the lessons she taught me regarding finances will always stick with me. For that I am forever grateful.

Of all the characteristics I have, I would say that my exceptionally high level of resilience would be the one I value most. Resiliency is valued more than any other characteristic because it has been my life’s biggest asset. Furthermore, I favor it because it’s a characteristic that many people in my life have not possessed. If my life could be defined by one word, it would be “Adversity”. My early childhood was impoverished due to my parents being fifteen and sixteen years old when I was born. I experienced the consequences of their toxic marriage until I was ten years old. At this point I experienced their bitter and less than cordial divorce. I then lived alone with my mother for all but one weekend every month. She was twenty-six, worked countless hours, and refused to not have a dating life. Her work hard, play harder partying lifestyle left me alone most of the time. We were financially unstable and moved quite often, between several ghettos and trailer parks. This situation resulted in me consistently being a new kid at all the schools I attended. I was the new kid, poor, and looked like a boy. Consequently, I was bullied quite often when I wasn’t ostracized by my peers. My mother had committed identity fraud and racked up several thousands of dollars in utility bills and credit card debt that she assigned in my name. I would later have to fix this. A few years post-divorce, my mother married a man named John. John was arrogant, oppressive, and played favorites with his children. Nothing I achieved was sufficient and I lived walking on eggshells until I graduated and moved out. Shortly after, I joined the military, married, and had three children at a decently early age, within a short span of time. After a second tour in Iraq, my then husband returned with PTSD. He was irritable and developed a drinking problem. This led to divorce several years later. Later, my mother passed away during her fourth bout of Breast Cancer. I loved her dearly, regardless of everything we experienced. I helped her through every bout she underwent. Her passing was devastating. Simultaneously, I experienced women’s health issues and underwent a partial hysterectomy at the age of twenty-nine. These are a glimpse of larger life events that I overcame. Adversity sweeps into the forefront like an overpowered train with no destination at all points of my life. My overwhelming favoritism towards resiliency is due to how much it’s shaped the woman I’ve become and the way it sets me apart from others. Possessing resiliency more than most adds value to my perception of self-worth. I’ve known many people within all places I’ve lived. Watching them fail at the hands of adversity is disheartening to say the least but reaffirms to myself all I have overcome and accomplished being at odds with my environment for the duration of my life. My resiliency has enabled positivity within all life situations, strengthened me, and has enabled me to adapt to every situation. This same resiliency will assist me in overcoming any challenge my life presents in the future. It gives me hope for survival and thriving in every part of life that I’ve not yet experienced. Resiliency has and will empower me to not be afraid of unknowns and enable me to be courageous, regardless of what the future holds. For these reasons, resiliency is my favorite characteristic within myself, it always has and always will help me in my life journey; to adversity, I am forever grateful.

There are many reasons education is important to me. Learning has been a lifelong passion of mine. Approximately ten years ago, I attended Washburn University and ultimately dropped out. Even though I was working full time, attending university full time, and raising my three children when they were smaller, I was handling the situation extremely well. After my second year of attendance, my mother fell ill to a fourth bout of Breast Cancer. The Pharmacy Technician job I had was accommodating for my course schedule but became unfriendly with maintaining my finances. My hours were being cut on a regular basis. After several months of this, I left school to assist in the care of my mother and to get a better paying job to further assist her and the well-being of my children. My mother passed a little over a year later, at the age of forty-six. I currently still hold the newer career I initiated at that time; I have advanced over the years and recently peaked in this position. It has become apparent that my hard work and dedication can no longer advance my career further; I must finish my degree and move forward with a different career. My passion for learning and having the ability to succeed within my career aspirations are a large reason why education is important to me. Education’s ability to enable me to inspire others in my life and set a strong example for my children are further justifications for education being extremely important. There are several people in my life that have settled with their situations and feel it is impossible to start over or to go back to school. Me going back to school and succeeding thus far has shown those around me that it is possible. There have been several of them that have been moved by this realization. Me pursuing my education has also made a difference to my children. It has shown them that no one is too old to pursue an education or their dreams. My education journey has also shown them thus far the importance of finishing what you start and the difference having an education can make within the parameters of their real life. My children are now teenagers and have only a few short years before they too will be joining me in the process of obtaining degrees and furthering themselves. I am currently in the process of completing my bachelor's degree in Human Resources and Organizational Leadership. After accomplishing this, I will be pursuing a Master's in the same field. This same education and its contributions to achieving my goals enable me to be an inspiration and motivation for my children; To be an example of strength and resilience in this arena of life, like I have shown them in all others. Education is much more than a piece of paper to me. It is an experience that fulfills me, enables exponential career growth and personal development, and enables me to be a strong example for my children and an inspiration to all those around me.

While reading the prompt for this scholarship’s required essay, I imagined the ways education could have shaped my understanding of the world, within the scope of a first-generation college student. In this process I realized that being underprivileged for most of my life served as motivation to better myself in excess outside the college education experience. My own hunger for learning and relentless quest to better myself schooled what has become the majority of my understanding of the world. Then I came to an interesting conclusion; there was in fact an area of my life that education altered profoundly. It was not receiving a broader or more well-rounded view of the world around me, or the way it operates. It was also not interests, knowledge of current affairs, an elevated reading and writing capacity, financial savvy, or a new appreciation for dedicating to follow through on things that I take on; these were already under my metaphorical belt. Education had mainly shaped my view of the world within the realm of personal relationships. It affected my perception of people and the bonds I shared with both them and I more specifically. Within my academics, I have completed an overwhelming number of psychology and sociology courses. Before my education, my knowledge regarding people and relationships formed from the small pool I had endured myself. From childhood into my late twenties, the limited long-term relationships I cultivated included my family, one childhood friend, and later my husband of many years. After the age of ten, my parents divorced. My childhood was impoverished and existing primarily with my mother. Considering she was only twenty-six when that journey began, I was left alone to take care of myself most the time. This was due to her endless work hours and desire to date. In addition, I was mistreated by my peers because I was poor, looked like a boy, and was consistently new to every slum area I moved to. I was bullied and rejected by my peers, due to things that weren’t in my control. I began to have a negative association with people and interacting with them. Living a lifestyle of extreme self-reliance devoid of social interaction resulted the maladjusted loner I soon became. I didn’t trust human beings or my environment, had a low self-esteem, and enjoyed little to no normal memories for kids remotely close to my age. When I turned eighteen, I joined the US Air Force and ultimately met my long-time husband. We married young and had three children together. After returning from a second tour in Iraq, he suffered of PTSD. Seven years into this marriage is the point I began my first education experience at a local university. The little over two years I spent at the university during that period of my life was a revelation in how I understood people and my closest relationships. All the various psychology and sociology classes and the on-campus education exposed me to learning from both the course material and interacting with other students about their lives. These events taught me something my life experience hadn’t. I began to understand PTSD, why peers mistreated me as a child, and how the most inner workings of most every long-term relationship I had was abnormal and toxic even. My education shaped my understanding of the world by opening my eyes to what I had experienced and why. It challenged my identity, the reality of what my fondest relationships were, and forced me to reevaluate my perspective of the past while encouraging me to make healthy changes for the future.

I find applying creativity to every aspect of my life to be essential in fulfilling my purpose. I believe myself to be a highly productive, motivated, and unique individual with various life aspirations. Currently, I am raising three teenagers, working full time with an hour commute each way, attending college full time as a junior, and I'm solely responsible for maintaining the wellbeing of my beloved pets and household. This is not including participating in my vast number of hobbies. I most frequently engage in gardening, going to the gym, reading, roller skating, collaging, and photography. In efforts to achieve everything within both realms, my use of creativity is the sole root of success; it enables me to balance all life passions and required duties. Specifically, I do this by incentivizing myself. I make every task a game or challenge, listen my favorite music or audiobooks while completing tasks, or gift myself smaller material rewards for completing milestones and larger goals. I create mental competitions to best my previous results and the results of anyone that I've known. Using these creative techniques in everything I do keeps me focused, motivated, consistently improving, and ultimately results in an exponential number of activities being completed. This use of creativity encourages me to enjoy even the most daunting of tasks, which encourages a more joyous perspective towards my life. In addition to these aspects, my creative strategies allow me an even more unique approach to teaching my children. To say creativity is an integral component of my life would be an understatement. I would dare to say it is my lifestyle in general.

I deserve this scholarship because my fingers are tired of typing my life's aspirations and goals to score cash so that I don't blow through my children's potential college funds myself. Funnily enough this is a real possibility, considering they are all three teenagers. This is literally the nineteenth application I have submitted in two days. Half of them requiring essays nearly has my wrists seized. My academic and/or career goals are to finish my bachelor's degree in Human Resources and Organizational Leadership and pursue my master's degree afterwards. Ultimately, I would like to pursue a better career with more learning opportunities and a higher salary. Showing my children that I can actually finish something I start would be an added bonus, as they are about to endure everything I am currently experiencing academically. There is not one obstacle that would properly define my life experience. My life is a fast-moving train of obstacles itself. I grew up poor, "ugly", and consistently being new to schools and towns. Underestimated, unappreciated, and oppressed...Life after age ten= NOT RECOMMENDED. I believe the obstacles we learn from most are those we don't technically overcome. For me, this would be my mother dying at the age of forty-six.