Victory is the sweetest when the difficulties are rightly tackled and resolved. I live by this motto, “ Don’t ever give up, keep on trying and you’ll get there”.  No matter how challenging the difficulty is, one should always keep on trying. Challenges should not be taken as a burden, but they should be taken as an opportunity to grow.

 

Balancing my academics and music. I love to play and hear music, I have also decided to pursue music as a career. Currently, I study in High School, the most important grade for career building. This year can make or break my dreams. Academics in India is different from the world, it has the most exhaustive and in-depth syllabus that I have come across. When you enter 12th grade, you receive the most qualitative syllabus and now I have to balance academics to complete my Trinity Certification, I know that when I find the right way to balance them, things will turnout fine eventually.
 

Not that all time we succeeded, I remember, back in the time when I was being trained for inline Skating and participated in city tournaments. I was nervous but excited too. I stood on the starting line and was ready to fly. The whistle blew and eight skaters dashed to complete laps. I was ahead of all but one and so focused to win it. I didn’t even realise that I was being pulled from the back. Someone just shoved me aside and zoomed past me to get ahead. I called out to the referees but they didn’t listen to me so I finished sixth that race. I was frustrated with myself for freezing in this situation and don’t know how to recover. But my Coach knew and he trained me even harder. He taught me how to flip turn and stand up again if I slip or fall. My mom suggested that I not only focus forward but also be aware of my surroundings. It was not easy but they said only practice is the way forward. I was motivated to win the next tournament. Seven months later, there was another skating tournament and I was ready to win it this time. I remember standing in front of the starting line when I saw my opponents face again. I remembered the humiliation and turned it into my strength. The whistle blew and I was off, racing again with great speed. This time, my opponent was nowhere to be seen and I was a lap ahead of him. I won the tournament and also learnt that failures of past are one of the best teachers too.

 

Not once but many times all situations don't come with happy endings, there had been times where I had given my best but might not result in success. Last year the School show we coordinated was nothing but disaster. Chosen to be played in outdoor setup but weather had its own plans. It was thunderstorm during dress-rehearsal and mock show day. Ciaos would be lesser adjective to define the aftermaths on the preparation and the students were demoralized. The show can’t be moved to another day and lucky for us next day was a beautiful sunny day. We went through detailed planning again and made the necessary improvement. Learn from our mistakes and correct the course for the Day. Finally, we hosted an incredible Show, no rain, no franic running backstage. Everything was great and we were finally happy we could pull this off and achieve the dream. We were just ‘staying alive’.

 

There were numerous tough challenges in my life but at no point I felt like giving up. Spanning over  the seventeen years of my life. Examples: Riding a bicycle, Learning a sport thoroughly , Trying out new skills, academics and studying to get good grades consistently  and so many more. But the two most difficult challenges that I have ever faced are overcoming the fear of dogs (cynophobia) and speaking out in front of a huge audience. When you overcome these kinds of challenges, you experience a gush of emotions and a feeling of being satisfied with finishing strong.