As a freshman, I got told to get involved in as many activities as possible, so I am currently on the exec board of two clubs, a member of five clubs, play two sports, have over 200 service hours, all while maintaining straight A’s. This sounds amazing, but it comes at a cost. My life has been filled with activities, practices, studying, and meetings. I lost some friendships since I was always busy. I am a hard worker, very responsible, and extremely organized, so instead of just attending things, I get asked to take on a leadership position. This often means I am responsible for planning, working, and cleaning up after an event, making it hard to just enjoy the activity while it is going on. I have had days where I come home and break down, due to the fact that I am so overwhelmed by everything on my plate. These once fun activities turned into a never-ending list of chores. I have learned that getting involved in school activities is very important and beneficial, but getting over-involved can take a toll on your mental health. I now know that you do not have to say yes to everything and that balance is important. There are many positives to being active, such as organizational skills, building confidence, and communication skills. While I lost some friends, I also gained some of my best friends while being involved in these activities. The biggest lesson for me is that I want to enjoy the activities I am involved in, which means I can not always be the leader.

In third grade I visited the Air force Academy in Colorado Springs. While I was there I decided that I was going to attend college at the Academy to become an aeronautical and astronautical engineer. Yes, that is what I wanted to do as a THIRD GRADER. This dream faded my freshman year of high school, but that is not the point of this story. This story is a representation of my life and my future. I always have big goals and want to accomplish a lot. I don’t want to just work a 9-5 in a twenty story office building. I want to do something unique that challenges me and benefits other people. One day I was watching an interview with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife. I came across philanthropy (Marks wife, Priscilla Chan, is a philanthropist). I did some research and watched some videos to learn about this career. Here is the definition I found, "the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes." This sounded perfect for me. I have a big passion for helping people, but I don’t have the money to just give away. At this point I was a sophomore in high school. I knew I wanted to help people around the world with philanthropy, but I did not know how I was going to get money to support my future family and help the world. My junior year I took a class called Entrepreneurship. I knew the class was business related, but I did not know much else. I ended up falling in love with the idea of starting my own business. My semester project was starting up a local healthy foods grocery store. This store would allow people to go shopping for food without having the temptation to grab sugary treats. Since it is all natural foods, the items would have a shorter shelf life, giving me an opportunity to give leftover food to people who can’t afford healthy food (a local homeless shelter for example). This is just one of my many business ideas for the future. Starting your business is a risk, so it appeals to the adventure side of me. I can make my businesses unique to appeal to my third grade self. I can also spread love, kindness, and money to those in my community and around the world to help make the world a better place. My biggest goal in life is to leave the world better than I found it.

In third grade I visited the Air force Academy in Colorado Springs. While I was there I decided that I was going to attend college at the Academy to become an aeronautical and astronautical engineer. Yes, that is what I wanted to do as a THIRD GRADER. This dream faded my freshman year of high school, but that is not the point of this story. This story is a representation of my life and my future. I always have big goals and want to accomplish a lot. I don’t want to just work a 9-5 in a twenty story office building. I want to do something unique that challenges me and benefits other people. One day I was watching an interview with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife. I came across philanthropy (Marks wife, Priscilla Chan, is a philanthropist). I did some research and watched some videos to learn about this career. Here is the definition I found, "the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes." This sounded perfect for me. I have a big passion for helping people, but I don’t have the money to just give away. At this point I was a sophomore in high school. I knew I wanted to help people around the world with philanthropy, but I did not know how I was going to get money to support my future family and help the world. My junior year I took a class called Entrepreneurship. I knew the class was business related, but I did not know much else. I ended up falling in love with the idea of starting my own business. My semester project was starting up a local healthy foods grocery store. This store would allow people to go shopping for food without having the temptation to grab sugary treats. Since it is all natural foods, the items would have a shorter shelf life, giving me an opportunity to give leftover food to people who can’t afford healthy food (a local homeless shelter for example). This is just one of my many business ideas for the future. Starting your business is a risk, so it appeals to the adventure side of me. I can make my businesses unique to appeal to my third grade self. I can also spread love, kindness, and money to those in my community and around the world to help make the world a better place. My biggest goal in life is to leave the world better than I found it.

In third grade I visited the Air force Academy in Colorado Springs. While I was there I decided that I was going to attend college at the Academy to become an aeronautical and astronautical engineer. Yes, that is what I wanted to do as a THIRD GRADER. This dream faded my freshman year of high school, but that is not the point of this story. This story is a representation of my life and my future. I always have big goals and want to accomplish a lot. I don’t want to just work a 9-5 in a twenty story office building. I want to do something unique that challenges me and benefits other people. One day I was watching an interview with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife. I came across philanthropy (Marks wife, Priscilla Chan, is a philanthropist). I did some research and watched some videos to learn about this career. Here is the definition I found, "the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes." This sounded perfect for me. I have a big passion for helping people, but I don’t have the money to just give away. At this point I was a sophomore in high school. I knew I wanted to help people around the world with philanthropy, but I did not know how I was going to get money to support my future family and help the world. My junior year I took a class called Entrepreneurship. I knew the class was business related, but I did not know much else. I ended up falling in love with the idea of starting my own business. My semester project was starting up a local healthy foods grocery store. This store would allow people to go shopping for food without having the temptation to grab sugary treats. Since it is all natural foods, the items would have a shorter shelf life, giving me an opportunity to give leftover food to people who can’t afford healthy food (a local homeless shelter for example). This is just one of my many business ideas for the future. Starting your business is a risk, so it appeals to the adventure side of me. I can make my businesses unique to appeal to my third grade self. I can also spread love, kindness, and money to those in my community and around the world to help make the world a better place. My biggest goal in life is to leave the world better than I found it.

2020 was supposed to be a fresh new start, a blank slate, a wonderful reset year. As soon as it started we knew it was going to be a year full of anger, bitterness, and stress. I was full of belligerent behavior. It was full of tears and self-harm. 2020 was not what we all thought it would be. It hit us like a brick wall. It was way uglier than we expected.

My biggest role model is my great grandpa. He is 98 years old and he has filled his life to its fullest potential. He is still living in his own home, driving himself everywhere, hanging out with friends, doing house work, supporting me and my siblings at our sporting events and concerts, and the biggest one, volunteering everywhere he can. He volunteers at our church, local thrift store, and delivering meals to other elderly people who cant get around as easily as him. My great grandpa has a bigger heart than anyone I know. He goes around telling stories and showing his smiling face to make other people happy. He brings so much joy to people and helps them out when they need it the most. This man is 98 years old! Other people should be serving him and taking care of him, but he cares more about other people to much. I am sure there is some days that he thinks it would be easier to sit in his chair and watch football all day, but he knows that making other peoples lives easier, makes his life better. I honestly think that is why he has lived so long. If you live your life in pure bliss you will live longer and you will enjoy every moment of it. My great grandpa was the one who taught me how to love and serve others around you. He inspires me to volenteer at places like he does and go on mission trips. I went on a mission trip to Mexico to help a family in need build a casita (a small house). I also went on a mission trip to Chicago to help an organization called JPUSA and their local homless shelter. Some of my favorite memories were made while on these mission trips helping other people. I used to not know what career I wanted to go into, but I always knew that I wanted to help people like my great grandfather. I went through so many different options, but non of them stood out to me.Then one day I was watching an interview with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife and I came across philanthropy (Marks wife Priscilla Chan is a philanthropist). I did some research and watched some videos to learn about this career. Here is the definition I found, "the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes." This sounded perfect for me. I imagined myself in the future owning my own business and donating a large portion of my profits to people in need. When I was imagining my future, I couldn't help, but think of my great grandfather helping people everyday of his life. I imagine that he will be proud of me some day and he will know that he made an impact on many people, but the impact he made on me will be spread out onto way more people then he could imagine.

Education to me is more than just English, science, and math. It is even more than how to communicate and treat other people. To me, Education is changing the world. It is one of the greatest opportunities we have. It is crazy to think how far education has come and how it has helped improve the world. It used to only be elite males who could learn. It eventually fled down to lower classes, then slaves, and then women. I think about this when I am in school to remember how great of luxury it is to get educated. Every year the world builds the education system to make it stronger. We still have a ways to go, but the value of education is growing year by year. Education such a powerful tool and if used correctly, the education system can create beautiful-hearted and intelligent human beings. One of my favorite quotes is very fitting to this topic. "Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school," Albert Einstein. The information that remains in our head is not how to find the missing angle of a triangle or whose name was written the biggest on the Declaration of Independence. The information that remains in our heads is all the life skills we learn, the relationships we build, and the character we create ourselves to be. The role of Education in my life is to help me and my classmates to become the type of people who could change the world.

"I am not staying fit because I need to be skinny, I am staying fit because I need to be strong." This quote describes my fitness life perfectly. I do a weight training workout everyday and I would like to add a cardio workout into my daily routine to help better balance my body, but I haven't gotten there yet. Once it gets closer to soccer season my team will get together and condition. We run together and do an core workout, which gets me in really good shape. I feel like I can just run forever and it motivates me to eat healthy since I am spending so much time and putting in so much work to become an excellent athlete. My weight training has also helped me be extremely successful in power lifting. I got third at state power lifting my freshman and sophomore year. Exercising and eating healthy helps keep me fit, which has helped me become a Varsity tennis and soccer player from my freshman year in high school. It motivates me to perform well for my team. I also love helping motivate my friends and family to stay fit. I believe that a healthy life is a happy life and I want everyone to enjoy life as much as I do. Someday, I want to inspire as many people as I can to stay fit and healthy to live a happy life. Its never too early or too late to work towards being the healthiest you.

I went on a mission trip to Rio Bravo, Mexico. It is a city that has a lot of poverty and was a little sketchy. There was risks that we could be taken by the cartel or not be let back into America, but we took the risk to help out our fellow Christians!

My biggest role model is my great grandpa. He is 97 years old, almost 98 and he has filled his life to its fullest potential. He is still living in his own home, driving himself everywhere, hanging out with friends, doing house work, supporting me and my siblings at our sporting events and concerts, and the biggest one volunteering everywhere he can. He volunteers at our church, local thrift store, and delivering meals to other elderly people who cant get around as easily as him. My great grandpa has a bigger heart than anyone I know. He goes around telling stories and showing his smiling face to make other people happy. He brings so much joy to people and helps them out when they need it the most. This man is 97 years old! Other people should be serving him and taking care of him, but he cares more about other people to much. I am sure there is some days that he thinks it would be easier to sit in his chair and watch football all day, but he knows that making other peoples lives easier, makes his life better. I honestly think that is why he has lived so long. If you live your life in pure bliss you will live longer and you will enjoy every moment of it. My great grandpa was the one who taught me how to love and serve others around you. He inspires me to volenteer at places like he does and go on mission trips. I went on a mission trip to Mexico to help a family in need build a casita (a small house). I also went on a mission trip to Chicago to help an organization called JPUSA and their local homless shelter. Some of my favorite memories were made while on these mission trips helping other people. I used to not know what career I wanted to go into, but I always knew that I wanted to help people like my great grandfather. I went through so many different options, but non of them stood out to me.Then one day I was watching an interview with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife and I came across philanthropy (Marks wife Priscilla Chan is a philanthropist). I did some research and watched some videos to learn about this career. Here is the definition I found, "the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes." This sounded perfect for me. I imagined myself in the future owning my own business and donating a large portion of my profits to people in need. When I was imagining my future, I couldn't help, but think of my great grandfather helping people everyday of his life. I imagine that he will be proud of me some day and he will know that he made an impact on many people, but the impact he made on me will be spread out onto way more people then he could imagine.