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The essay I chose is “Infatuation” by Reignmarc Vincent Labuguen.

I chose this essay because I, myself, am a very spontaneous person. I joined the STEAM team in S1 because they told me I would be able to fly drones. And who doesn't like mini flying machines?

This essay resonated with me deeply. The writer speaks about his experiences with basketball and public service, remembering how both campaigns failed but helped bring him out of his comfort zone. This is something I can relate to. Back in S2, I had no idea what project management was. But when I was chosen as the project manager of the team, how could I refuse? I learned everything I could about project management, winning one competition but losing the Regional Finals when it really mattered. After the disappointment wore off, I realized that learning project management was more important to me than winning Regionals. Now, I could schedule my studies more efficiently and balance my passions with academics. Overall, I'm glad my infatuation with F1 in Schools brought me to Project Management.

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The essay I chose is the first one “I Am Enough” by Adrianna Adame. This essay talks about how Adrianna, the author felt inside her heart the whole time, a failure. She always thought that she was not good enough for others, such as being smarter, friendlier, or even prettier. She also criticized herself not not putting all her effort into doing her work.

The reason why I chose this essay is because it relates and resonates with our situation in life. As secondary students, our schedules are always packed with quizzes, dictations, homework, projects, and extracurricular activities, which are very tiring. In addition to school stress, stress from family and friends is also the main cause of teenagers feeling that they are not “good enough” for others.

For example, a teacher returns homework to a student and the student gets a bad grade. The student, like me, will feel very disappointed at it and think, “Oh, what if I did xxxand not xxx? Would I have gotten a much higher grade?” Comparison with peers is also a main cause of teenagers feeling that they are not enough. Peers may compare their grades, or even financial status with each other just to strive for a little bit of “glory”. As said in the essay, the author thought that she was a failure just for not being pretty enough.

Another reason for this is your closest friends talking behind your back. We know, backstabbing hurts, but it is true. We always have to be aware of the people around us, even our closest friends. Maybe sometimes you think that he or she is your closest friend, but does he or she think that you are his or her closest friend? Once you find out that someone is talking behind your back, you will try to find out who started it first, and in the worst case scenario, “your closest friend”.  You will start to question yourself, “Why would he or she do that? Was I not good enough as a friend? What have I done wrong to make him and she feel this way and talk behind my back?“ ”Was I not friendly or nice to them enough?“. These thoughts that surround our ”closest friends“ hurt. It hurts when you know what your “closest friends” think about you. Therefore from these experiences, teenagers will start to have resentful feelings and not want to express their feelings with their friends.

The expectations from our closest people, our parents, are also one of the causes of the decreasing self-esteem. Our parents have high expectations, as they want their child, us to have and strive for a better future. We are always criticized for our grades by our parents, without them knowing how much we have worked the achieve this grade. Over time, we will think just like the author has said “not fulfilling the unrealistic expectations that I had burdened upon myself and by the people closest to me” feeling down as we are not fulfilling the expectations of our closest people, which can lead to the overthinking among teenagers for “Am I good enough for them? Could I have done something better? Do they deserve a better son or daughter rather than me?“ These thoughts can also lead to stressful environments in daily life, where they always think that they are not good enough for them.

Relating to the “Believes” topic. As the thoughts of “ Am I good enough?” grow inside the hearts and minds of many stressful teenagers, they will start to feel that their lives are aimless and just studying and comparing all over. As mentioned in the previous essay, having a belief can be a “string”,  an “energy drink” or even a source of light in their lives to help perplexed teenagers who think that they are floating aimlessly. The string, which symbolizes belief can hold onto the miserable teenager and prevent him or her from drifting away. The energy drink can act as a boost and motivation to the drained teenager from his or her busy and stressful daily life. The source of light coming from the end of a dark cave can act as a torch coming from success, where teenagers can follow and reach success at last. These three symbols can work together and help the teenager to “pull together” and hold on until they reach the very end of the dark cave.

Therefore, I think this essay, resonates with me a lot at this stage of life as a secondary school student, where I, am getting more and more miserable from the busing and stressful daily life of friends and family.

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I chose Adrianna Adame’s “I Am Enough”, this essays really speaks to me as a teenager. I’m always stressed by the expectation from school and from my family. the pressure to get good grades is very intense. i am always worried that if i don’t do well on my tests, I’m letting my parents and teachers down. Adrianna said “I often feel like I’m not good enough.” and i can totally relate to that feeling.

Teenager’s nowadays can have a crowded schedule, try and handle everything at once, with school, homework, quizzes and test, with family responsibilities as well. I want to do well in everything but it feels like there’s never enough time.

Family expectations add to my stress too. I feel like my parents always want me to follow their choice of specific careers instead of my own dreams and who i want to be. friendships can be hard to handle as well, like at some point you have to act a certain way to fit in. This quote “I am enough just as I am.” by Adrianna really inspired me to accept who i am myself. What i learned from this essay is I’m enough just as I am.

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I chose “I am Enough” by Adrianna Adame because I relate to the author’s message a lot. I tend to overthink and compare myself to others. I agree with the author that we need to let go of dark and anxious thoughts, in order to be present in our own lives, otherwise we will only be trapped in a cycle of talking ourselves down.

Something that made the essay interesting was how the author compared her situation to being afloat in the open sea. I think it tied in her experience at Monterey Bay, and also helped deliver the essay’s message. Surviving a stormy sea usually requires the help of others, just like how we need to communicate with others when facing anxieties and problems in life.

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I chose “Patience and Perseverance” by Erica Gershom because I can relate to it as a volleyball player.

First, the author was facing family tragedies and academic challenges. In volleyball, we also need to overcome various difficulties. There are times when we face tough opponents, injuries, or even internal conflicts within the team. Just as the author had persevered through her father's disability and her mother's stroke, we have to push through these setbacks in volleyball. We can't give up or lose hope when we are losing a game or when a key player gets injured.

Secondly, the positive mindset is crucial. The author emphasized the importance of having a positive attitude to keep going, which is just like volleyball. Maintaining a positive mindset during a game is essential. My coach always says “If you are down after fail to receive a serve, then I will definitely change you with other player. Because you will keep rethinking that one point in the whole match, and hence affect your performance. It is just a point out of 25 points, think positively and reset yourself for the next ball.” We can see positive mindset is very important. It can boost our confidence, help us make better decisions on the court, and keep us motivated.

Lastly, the success is measured by the effort we put in rather than just the outcome. In volleyball, even if we don't win the inter - school competition, the hard work that we put into training, the skills that we have developed, and the teamwork we've cultivated are all achievements.

Just as the author is proud of reaching milestones in her journey to becoming a doctor, I can be proud of our growth as volleyball players, feeling regardless of the final result in the competition. I chose because it shares the values of patience and perseverance that are applicable in both academic and sports.

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The essay I chose is “I Am Enough” by Adrianna Adame. This essay is mainly about Adrianna thinking of her life as a failure, she thinks that she is not smart enough, not friendly enough, and not pretty enough, having dark thoughts of herself. But in the end, she realised that she wasn’t a failure by improving her thoughts like not fulfilling unrealistic expectations.

I think that this essay is really relatable to me especially as a teenager as I have faced similar problems as her, like being stressed about academics, and having high expectations from myself and my parents. Sometimes when I did not fulfill my expectations, I felt like I was not good enough just like how Adrianna thought so of herself as well. The accumulation of family stress and academic stress has weighed me down a lot, and I have been doubting myself all the time.

Teenagers today have a very packed schedule with continuous extracurricular activities after school, dictations, quizzes, tests, and exams from school. When I receive the papers back and do not get the grade that I wanted to obtain, I always start to question myself whether I really have paid enough effort to it and regret what I could've and could not have done when I was studying.  The high expectations I have for myself have made me feel like I will never be good enough and be the person that I want to be.

However, I, who had similar problems as Adrianna. After reading this essay that she wrote, there is one quote that has made my thoughts change ever since, she said “I believe that I am enough”. After going through these negative thoughts and high expectations, she has realised that she wasn’t a failure, and that she was successful in many ways. Relating it to myself, the preposterous high expectations I had is the main cause that has been weighing me down. I feel profoundly inspired by this quote as I learnt to accept myself and just accept that I am good enough as who I am, and will be striving for improvement in the future, but of course, not with ludicrous expectations.

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The essay I chose is “The Power of Potstickers” by Lauren Brown. I chose it because it is about things we all do - cooking and dealing with changes. Students like me always face situations and challenges where we need to adapt, so I felt really relatable.

I thought this essay taught me a lot. When Lauren's mother was teaching her to cook, like how to use a pressure cooker or steam potstickers, it made me feel like I was right there. Her mother says cooking is an art, not just following rules. Lauren struggled with this concept at first. When making traditional Taiwanese dishes, Lauren's mother has to compromise due to her brother's picky eating. She swapped ingredients of the potsticker to suit his taste.

Later, Lauren goes to college, her mother packed a freezer bag full of pre-prepped food from her home. After Lauren’s roommates asked for tastes of her meals, she started to learn to compromise it. She adjusted her recipes according to their preferences and restrictions. At first, She was scared the new ingredients would make the food bad, but she found herself liking the alternatives more than the recipes.

This shows that trying new things and being flexible can be really good. This is also similar to how we learn. Sometimes, we have a specific way of studying, like using notes. But when that doesn't work for a complex math concept, we have to be like Lauren and adjust our "ingredients." For example, we might switch to a new way like  asking someone to help or searching it online. It also shows that it is okay to change the "recipe" of a traditional method and find our own unique method.

When Lauren went to college, she had to adjust her recipes according to her roomates’ preferences and restrictions. It is like starting a new school term. We have to meet new classmates, and accept different teaching styles. By changing the way of thinking like Lauren, we may have new friends and develop the interest of different subjects.

This essay makes me realize that compromise is not always a negative thing and can lead to new discoveries or experience. It also teaches me to compromise and go out of my comfort zone.

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I chose “The Power of Potstickers” by Lauren Brown. This essay is mainly about the cooking experiences the writer had with her mother. The writer’s mother taught the writer how to cook, especially because the writer was about to enter college with no cooking experience. It was mentioned that the writer’s younger brother preferred American cuisine rather than the Taiwanese cuisine their mother cooked, which the writer feels despair about him not respecting the food of their culture.

It is a pretty interesting article to read because it had lots of details about the writer cooking with her mother, and the way that she mostly used the examples when she failed to follow the recipe because it just tells the readers about perseverance. The writer mainly focuses on her own experiences in cooking, while mentioning occasionally that her roommates would be interested in what she’s cooking, which highlights the topic that the reader had succeeded in creating a meal after lots of practice. Moreover, cooking is a pretty important survival skill, and seeing people learn how to cook while failing from time to time, showing that it isn’t easy truly inspires and intrigues me.

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I chose the essay "I believe in loving myself" by Samantha Sparkenbach. This essay highlights how social media can seriously damage you and trigger comparison, and how she regained her confidence and, with time, she healed and started loving herself again. It was a raw and touching essay that explores self-growth and confidence, how the author faces comparison due to social media, and how she overcomes it.

To begin with, the author installed social media because a majority of people she's a part of use it too. She was trying to fit in and was convinced it was necessary for communication and searching inspiration online. Soon, she started comparing her life with thousands of other girls embracing theirs. She felt a sense of dissatisfaction from hers and commented how dull it was.

Furthermore, the reason I chose this essay is because I truly relate to her situation. Each sentence she wrote felt seriously emotional. In her essay, she empathised about how social media made her anxious about her appearances. It came to my attention that we were suffering from the same dilemma. I constantly felt like missing out on my life whenever I noticed how other people's lives compared to mine. I was comparing my chapter one to their chapter twenties.

In addition, whenever I noticed an online influencer posting about herself, I would get envious. It came to my concern how unsatisfying my life is. Like the author, I'm terribly scared of mirrors because whenever I see my reflection, there's always something to complain about. I, too, was viewing myself completely differently after constantly going through social media, despite knowing most of them were likely photoshopped. I'd like to admit, I'm an easily jealous person, and social media completely destroyed me.

Social media has been commonly used around the globe, this revolves around teenagers, too, many of us used social media for communication and entertainment, I think comparison in socials is almost normalised among individuals. Many underestimated the damage comparison can do and how it can affect teenagers and even adults.

I inspire to have the same mindset as the author. I want to love myself again, as awkward as it might sound.  I want to find my own inner peace and feel comfortable in my own skin. I want to believe in loving myself, and I hope to believe that, through deactivating social media, I can love myself again.

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The essay I chose was ‘I believe in healing’. It is about Yahaira Cazares’ healing journey after a painful experience in 2017. Despite the incident, she strongly thinks that hope will help and take part in her journey. She also endures pain while welcoming happiness, which helps and motivated her. The moments with her dog and family allow love to heal her. The visit to Mexico helped her realize that even kids can heal as they believe that good outweighs evil.

I chose this essay as it talks about a journey that involves pain and happiness, and it says that it’s okay to experience lots of emotions through the journey of healing. In the essay, hope is very important as it helps motivates Cazares and the kids at Mexico to continue the journey. I also like the message of the essay which is about finding hope, change, and go through the stages of growing and healing.

After reading the essay, it taught me the importance of love, hope and perseverance. It made me understand that there will be always room for healing and there will always be time for us to understand why things happen.

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The essay I chose was “I Am Enough” by Adrianna Adame.

It talked about the journey of the mindset of thinking that she wasn’t enough to saying something good about herself. At first, she thought that she wasn’t good enough and she was a burden to the people around her. This made her suffer from anxiety and eating disorder so much. But when she realised that she wouldn’t be able to fulfil all of the unrealistic expectations that she set herself, she began to accept mistakes and learned to love herself more.

I chose this essay because it relates to teenagers a lot as there are so many talented students in this generation and expectations towards us are getting higher and more unrealistic. This essay made me think that being perfect and good at everything shouldn’t be normalised and it made me realise that I don’t have to fulfil everyone’s expectations of me.

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The essay I chose is “I am enough”.it is about the writer thinks that she’s not enough for this society and she’s a failure. at last, she thinks she should be herself without the burden of negative thoughts and unrealistic expectations and live optimistically.

I chose this essay because it strongly relate to me.in daily life, people give a high expectation to us. For example, my mum expects to be good at every subject. however, no one is perfect. I can’t fulfill her expectation. She always compares me with other students, which is better than me.this makes me feel stressed as I know I can’t be her ideal daughter that she wants.i am always not ‘good enough’.so what should I do ? Give up on those subjects that I’m not good at? or keep being emo for not being good enough?

This essay inspired me no one is perfect. we should think of our strengths,think optimistically,telling yourself you also have strengths, not only have weaknesses. however, it is not like you give up on improving your weaknesses.try to improve things that we are not good at by asking people who are better than you in that area and learn from them.

In conclusion, No one is perfect, and everyone has their weaknesses. We should not be too pessimistic about our weaknesses and just remember there is always someone will help you and guide you.

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The essay I chose is “I believe in healing” written by Yahaira Cazares. It is about the author who had an experience which made the past year very different for her family and her. She took a long time to get over this, and did things she enjoyed, such as going to Mexico, to distract her mind about the incident. Although it took some time, she managed to heal herself from that and she feels better now. She also understood that the negative experience is a chance for her to grow and change, which made her feel better about the experience.

I think this essay is extremely relatable to us. We often encounter experiences in our lives that make us really unhappy, and we always think that we have to live under the shadow of that forever. However, if we give some time to ourselves, and do things we enjoy, we will gradually forget about that or stop having negative thoughts. We should be like the author and have hope in life, that pain is not permanent but couldn’t be escaped, so instead of feeling bad about negative experiences, we should see it as a chance for growth and change.

I had a really bad academic result last year and I felt very sad. Now, after reading this essay, I learnt to see those experiences as a way to grow. Instead of blaming myself, I should reflect on how to improve my results.

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I chose “I am enough” by Adrianna Adame. The essay is about how Adrianna felt in her heart how she was always not perfect enough compared to other people her age. She thought of herself as a failure and that she could never do better than others. She criticises herself for not being good enough and the weight of the self-hatred and low self-esteem that she had made herself feel like she was drowning. She pretended that everything was okay when it’s actually not, she would look at herself in the mirror, tearing herself down. To me, I think that self consuming is bad for both our physical health and mental health. For example people who thinks that they’re fat eat nothing but very little vegetable to control their body weight. It makes them feel unsatisfied even if they are less fat.

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The essay that I chose is “I am enough” by Adrianna Adame. The writer talked about how she thought herself as worthless and not enough, discriminating herself to the point where issues like extreme anxiety and eating disorders were caused. Later on she changed her point of view and started to appreciate things she was able to achieve, changing to a more positive mindset.I am able to understand and relate with her thinking. As a teenager, I frequently compare my own attributes with others, which turns out with a similar result as how the text mentioned “I have always thought of myself as a failure” ,struggling to find my strengths and accomplishments that can make me feel worthy. Still I was able to be inspired by how the writer attempted to solve their own misery and problems instead of staying in the dark, “I would never be able to fulfill those unrealistic expectations” that she mentioned gave me the thought of not pushing myself too harshly, but instead assigning smaller steps for myself might just do the trick.

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I chose the essay "The power of Potstickter" by Lauren Brown. I chose this essay from reading the title which included the word "Potstickers", I was intrigued to know more since food was involved and as I read along, I felt a spark of connection with it.

As someone who also likes to cook occasionally, I found the essay quite fitting to my own way of doing things.

In the essay, she tweaks different recipes and uses ingredients to her own measurements rather than following whats written, and which sometimes was, changes for the better.

I love trying out a new way to do things, not following the guidebook and adding a but of my own spice to what I do. I think it is more prominent through my art and drawings. Although people mostly already have a mindset of what looks good and what doesn't, there is no concrete right-or-wrong in art, you really can do it your way, and that's the part of art that I love, the creative freedom you get, for you to try out your ideas as you wish.

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Essay that I have chosen: “Faith, Hope, and Love” by Karen Siguenza

Because…

-I was attracted by the language used in this essay, which mostly is narrative language.

-I feel like it is structured and detailed with its narrative language used, and it makes it very different from all the essays there.

-More than a half of the essay had been used narrative language with some descriptive language through it, and about half of it had been used argumentative language.

-The structure of this essay is very special, since it is a bit different from what I have learnt in class. In class, I have learnt that, the essay should be divided in introduction, body and conclusion clearly. But in this essay, it doesn’t really follow this structure. But it seems to have another structure, which first tells the personal experience of the writer and clearly states out the writer’s belief at last. This special structure has made me feel a sense of casual and aroused my interest, which attracted me a lot on reading it.

-In the last paragraph, there are quite a lot of quotes are being used to support the writer’s stance, which make the whole essay be more detailed.

I think…

-I feel connected with the writer. The example that she went through rough time, but luckily she was supported by her parents, that motivated her to keep on working hard, as to get a good job and make her parents proud of her.

-I also went through rough time, in rough time obviously we would not think in a positive and  rational way. But I really felt thankful that I have good friends, teachers and family to support me that time, and get out of the haze with me. Their support brought me hope, and with that hope, I got faith that I could pass the rough time. And the best way I think that could prove them I am really thankful to them is to get good academic results and love them back.

-I think my experience is kind of similar to the writer’s. But one thing I want to add is that, those three things(faith, hope, love) are bidirectional. The way we are loved, we also want to love people like that.

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I chose to read “I Am Enough” by Adrianna Adame. Honestly, as a perfectionist, this title really caught my attention. In the past, copying just a short paragraph could take me an hour. I was never happy with my writing. To me, it never looked tidy enough or consistent enough… I always felt like I wasn’t perfect, like I needed to be better and better, wanting to be the best at everything. But that led to a lot of pressure and anxiety that almost drowned me. I lost my desire for life and became really negative.

Then something changed for me which is I became more self-aware. I realised I was in a bad and dangerous place. I tried to save myself out of it, just like what the writer said, “When I was staring at the cold and harsh waves of Monterey Bay one night, I realised that I didn’t want to drown.”

I started to “climb onto the lifeboat and communicate with people in my life.” That’s who I am now. It doesn’t mean I have become lazy or unambitious. I have just learned to chill out a bit. I feel happier about what I can do and I’m learning to accept my weaknesses.

This essay is really good. It’s compelling and relatable. The way the writer described people who feel like they’re not enough is spot on and suitable. He compared it to being in a sea and pressure, sadness, and anxiety are like waves. Climbing onto the lifeboat means accepting that “I am enough.” It’s a successful essay, and I think it’s important to just be a more relaxed version of ourselves.

Let’s be a chill guy.

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I chose "The Power of Potstickers" by Lauren Brown. When it comes to work, especially if it happens to be a project I care about, I really don't like compromising. Something about not using your own art style, or letting some else write a document, though their formatting is not what you're used to, feels off and often times, leaves a feeling of despair of what it could've been, what I sacrificed. Lauren's essay resonated with me when she told the story of flowing into compromise to her roommate's several preferences and restrictions when it came to food from her hometown, the unfilimilar way felt strange and unwelcoming, but as time passed on, she came to appreciate the alternatives and found joy in experimenting. That's how I feel about joining a competition where I had to share the same role as someone else whom I barely knew, and design style was drastically different from mine. The entire time was a competition on who could persuade our dear teammates to agree on whose artwork looked better, it was exhausting and took a toll on everyone's spirit. We ended up losing the competition in low spirits with blame thrown at everywhere, I realized that this wasn't how I wanted it to be and decided it was time to let go and give something else a try. Overtime, I learnt to appreciate the compromises made for someone else, I recognized how pushing myself to attempt the unfamiliar helped me expand my skill set, and get to know other people more, which I think it what really matters in the end.

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The essay I chose was "I am enough". This passage is mainly about how the writer has to overcome hardships and accepting herself. The writer had depression , often thought she was really worthless herself, and not being enough. She often drowned herself with these thoughts. But one day, while she was in Monterey bay, she realised that she did not want to continue to live a miserable life, she thought of the different people which contributed to her life when she needed most, In fact she wanted to live a life where she could accept herself. She took the first step and let go of her negative thoughts. The main message of the story is recognising your own self worth and self acceptance. the passage encourages us to embrace our own true self and that we are all successful in our own ways.

As a insecure, bipolar and depressed teenager, I often struggle with finding my own self worth, I somehow connect with this passage, because I always think that I am not smart enough and not pretty enough. for example, no matter how many pounds of makeup i put on, how much weight I try to lose. nothing seems to change. I am still not enough.

Secondly, getting good grades is something very unrealistic that I could never achieve unless im mentally stable. My parents often gave me the mindset that if I don't do well in school I've already failed in life. In fact, how well I do in school also affects my parents love for me. I once tried pushing myself to the limit when I was in s2, my grades were peak, however my parents still never seem to think I am enough, I did not too. Now that im s3, im so tired living again, i felt like the only thing that kept me alive were my friends.

The reason why I chose this one is because I feel like it resonates with me so deeply, it inspired me to find my own self worth and that I am enough in my own ways. I should start healing and letting go of my own negative thoughts.