RIDDLE

I am pleasing to your mentality.
My contrasting sounds laze many.
The vibrations bounce off fyour gold jewlery.
The melodic harmony soothes the heart.
I do not appreciate when I have been mimicked,
Because my melody is often diminished.

FINAL COLLEGE ESSAY

“Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough” – Og Mandino

            Every single person has experienced a time in their life when it seemed easier to just give up than to try harder. The human mindset leads one to believe as being unable to reach the impossible. Therefore, this limits us from the profound opportunities that are to come in the future. I used to think, “What’s wrong with people? Why can’t they just suck it up and try harder?” Then, I soon found myself in a similar situation when I took on the challenge of Extemporaneous Speaking for debate tournaments.

            Extemp is known to be one of the harder events of debate competition. Participants are to go into a tournament without any knowledge of the topic to be spoken about. When a judge hands you a topic, you are given thirty minutes to come up with a seven minute speech using news articles previously read. Seems impossible, right? I didn’t think so. I saw myself as blowing through Extemp with flying colors.

Until my first debate practice.

            I’ll never forget my first question, “What’s next for Egypt?” I was very confident with my knowledge about the protests going on in this region. I would quickly make an outline with facts and supporting evidence. Finally, I stood in front of my debate coach and classmates to give this speech. I confidently spoke my opening attention getter and suddenly froze.

            I couldn’t believe it! I completely forgot the topic and main arguments that I had so boldly constructed. Someone would read me a little of the next sentence which would get me going but not for long. I’d forget what comes next and freeze. My only form of stalling was to “ummm” between each sentence. A classmate counted the amount of times I “umm”’ed and it was up to thirty-one times in one speech!

            I thought it was a onetime incident, but as weeks went on, I showed no improvement. I told myself I was done. There was no way I was going to be able to make a perfect speech. The inability to properly deliver a speech convinced me that I was going to make a fool out of myself at the upcoming competition

            After giving up for weeks and being completely bummed about the situation, I came across a YouTube video of a girl participating in Extemp for a national tournament. That’s when it really hit me that I wanted to go to a national competition, participating in Extemp. I went to school that week determined as ever, receiving many topics and giving as many speeches as possible.

            Tournament day came and I had never been more nervous. I went into my first round and came out feeling as confident as ever. I ended up being a semi finalist that weekend and went home with a trophy. I felt like I had just accomplished something that once seemed impossible. Instead of believing that my goal was unattainable, I proved myself wrong.