Currently stuck in my junior year of high school. Currently waiting for the longest and hardest year of high school to be over. People always say, “Enjoy it while it lasts” but why am I not enjoying anything? How could I enjoy a year in high school that I am barely getting through? Why do I dread getting up every morning to go learn something that I can’t wrap my head around? Why do I put all this pressure on myself to get through the year with good grades? How come anything lower than an ‘A’ will never be enough for me? What is motivating me to get through this year of hell?

Traveling. Exploring. The chance in life to make everything worth it. Finding that dream and getting accepted into the college that offers it. Nailing the interview and getting that dream job. Finding someone to spend the rest of my life with. Building a family and loving them. The motivation to get through high school for me is the future. Yes, I do think about giving up, everyone does at some point. It’s like a waiting game. The game that people dread because they don’t know when it’s their turn in life. The game that keeps people on their toes. The game of taking chances. It’s risky, but isn’t that just life? 

You sit down with other people at the table, waiting to see who gets to roll the dice first. Everyone is anxious and some people want to leave the second they sit down. Then, someone makes the first move. Someone makes their first choice in life, their first risk. Now, they could play the game right and everything can work out, or they could bend the rules and it could all go downhill. It’s the player's choice. Everyone at the table has had their first turn, everyone has chosen to follow the rules of life. The next round comes up, and the player next to you gets impatient and tries to bend the rules to get to where they want to be. Everything seems fine at the moment, until a few rounds later. They keep slowly rolling back down the hill and everything is a domino effect until they are left with nothing. That’s the game of life.

If you play by the rules, then you succeed. If you don’t, then you dig yourself a hole bigger and bigger each round that is eventually too hard to get out of. It is the player's choice. Everyone has a vision of what they want to become in the future. The question is, are you going to be like the player next to you, or will you decide to play the right way? You cannot force the future, you cannot rush it either. Your future starts when you are young and you build on it every round of your life. That is why the junior year of high school is important. That is why it is important to not give up on your dreams. The future is bright, what will you do to get there? I choose to let life run its course. I will be able to travel, find my dream job, and start a family. But that all starts right here, in my junior year of high school.