I Want to Do More

I’ve mentioned it before and I’ll mention it again in this post; I am going to do more than anything possible in this suburb of a city that is just now feeling some gentrification. I don’t want to sound like a jerk, but I am better than this place. This place whose downtown area is just a ton of bars and restaurants with barely any shops in between, with the only store that isn’t very expensive being the Salvation Army. This place whose middle schoolers shouted a racist chant during lunch and ended up on national news because they’re actually that stupid. This place where the entire high school is divided into cliques with very few willing to step outside them. This place where it is not possible to succeed unless you take AP classes and make your own path in school. This place that I have to leave to get to where I need to go in my life.

I am someone who knows what she wants to go into in her life. I want to pursue my law degree and I feel a strong need for social justice activism. This need has only recently come about, but it’s actually part of an awakening in my life. I already knew that I am going to do something good in my life, but now I’m finally beginning to understand what it will be. For now, I’m going to work on projects in the advocacy section of my Model United Nations team and I hope to be the advocacy officer next year. That’s currently what I see myself being able to do, but I want to do more with my life than just that. I know that I have to wait until I go back to school to really be able to tell how much I’ll be able to stretch myself. I’m doing more this year than I have before and I’m probably underestimating what will need to be done in my every day life.

Whatever I do, it won’t be accomplished where I am right now. Not in my location or in high school, which I’ll be in for about another two years. It’s frustrating being able to see my future so far ahead like this, but it is what it is. I want to be an accomplished student. What is also important to me is being an accomplished person. I want to feel successful and to do that I can’t just do things related to school. I know myself and I know that I want to be part of something bigger than all of that. School may be my primary focus, but it cannot be my only focus. I refuse to let my life be that way.