I want to give this speech to my whole family. I never find myself doing the thing I love before 2016. My life was full of confusion, depression, stressed, pain, guilt, and a lot more. Until nothing hit me harder than life then everything changed. I want to share my life experienced in the hardest situations, who always stay and never give up on me during those hard time.
I didn’t blame the year, but around 2014 and 2015 was not nice to me. The reason was that I met car accident in December 2014 after everything get fixed, my neighborhood reversed her car to touch the front of my car again in May 2015. In November, last year my grandfather started to question how I am doing at school and my major and asking why I am still at Lone Star College almost four years. The reason behind all of that messed was I found myself study the major that I don’t like at all, but I never dare to tell that to my family. I don’t want to kill their dream of wanted me to become a pharmacist one day. I keep taking the classes that I have no motivation to push myself up to the point I need to be and made unwanted grade over and over.
I never take any actions to fix those consequences or discuss with anyone even my family. I keep living in the kind of situations that I have no power to move on. I keep thinking that no one will understand me, and wake up each day to repeat the same boring life. It was the worst nightmare I ever have. Until one night around 9pm, I got a phone called from my aunt that I need to be at her house after work. When I got to her house, there are four people who waiting for me. They started to ask how I did in school so far, and when I will plan to transfer to another school like the university to finish my degree. I was scared, angry, and out of control at that time due to their questions. It turns out that they need to see my grade, so they can help, and move me forward to achieve my dream.
After they get to see my report, of course, they full of surprise for all these years that I keep remain silent. They started to help plans thing different for me. That period of my life where I know who is stay by my side, who have seen my tears, who understand me during my worst, who heals me, calm me down, and who still accepted me for who I am. It turned out that the whole family has been given all the support, and correct my mistakes, especially my aunt and uncle who been a great guidance since I first moved here. She is not just my aunt, but also play a role as a mom who would yell at me, if I did something wrong, but never change her love for me. I can count her as my friend who stays to cheer me up on my bad day. She also my adviser whenever I need her presence, who I share my mood when I am happy or stress in life. The last but not least, she is my mentor who will make a phone call just want to know am I doing fine when she feels I am too silent.
These whole 2016 has taught me many lessons from my past mistakes for taking the wrong road to success. For me, without those hard time, I will never have appreciated all the moments in my life. It is the blessing year even I went through a lot of tough time. Looking back if my family never took that actions with my school progress or get into my case, I will never find myself, love myself, know what I want out of life, or appreciated my family more than I ever do, and lucky enough to born as the oldest out of five sisters, first granddaughter and their first niece, and the last have a chance to get on the right track again with the major that fit my interest.
I want to say huge thank for their unconditionally love that I received since I was born until now, especially to my grandfather who has been the one that cares too much about my education, and because of that he took me from the small town where I lived with my mom, and sisters since I was eight years old, so I can pursue an education in the big city. He always reminds me how important it was for my first grade, and he still checks on me until today. He said that born as a woman is not easy, yet without the education will make my life harder to live in this competitive world while some people out there will look down, and he doesn’t want that to happen on me or all his grandkids. I also want to say thank my mom even she not here by my side when I’m on my knees or when I need her the most, but her powerful love remains in my heart, and all her hard work that I saw when I was a little kid was encouraged every day to stay strong, and never a day that I want to give up on my life no matter how hard the situations can be, and I think it was enough for me. My grandmother who make sure that all her grandkids have food on the table to eat, and the last is my aunt and uncle who believe in me that I can make a change after thousand mistakes, make me speak up my voices, and use my actions to overcome all the obstacles, and fear in front of me, and keep pushing me to meet my future goals.
Today give you a chance to see the world in new perspective no matter what you have done or walked through, to be brave enough to use your voice to control your life, to create the whole entire new you from your past mistakes, and it is okay to wake up, and find yourself a new person from the day before. You are strong enough to make all your dreams come true if you have passion, purpose, and put your heart into it. Your past will never define who you are, but your present will get you to where you need to be in the future.