Personal Narrative: My Graduation Cap

Tossing my graduation cap into the air was a bitter-sweet moment. It symbolized all my proud accomplishments and hard work over the years--the sweat, the tears, the joy, the Monday morning coffees and countless hours of trying to staying awake until 1AM to prepare for the final exam. Throwing the graduation cap into the air also symbolized ambiguity-- something I feared.

I was always the type of person who knew exactly what I wanted to do with my life thanks to my parents’ support and LEAP. My goals were to graduate with a 4.0 GPA by June, join the Varsity Track & Field team by Junior Year, complete 200 hours of community service at the Zimmer Children’s Museum by December and last but not least, become president of my high school club before
I knew that everyone in this world is here for a reason and that death will come to all of us one day, so what can I do to leave a mark in this world? I knew for a fact that what I truly wanted is to live a life where I can impact the generation ahead of me for the greater good. One of the biggest way I learned to fulfill this purpose was through The LEAP Foundation. I have been a part of LEAP for 4 years, but in the summer of 2015, I was offered the opportunity to become a mentor for high school students as a leadership coach. Being a coach has given me a broader perspective of who I wanted to be and the life I wanted to live even after I left the comfort of high school life. The more and more I began to emphasize the principles to my group of students, the more I began to reevaluate and remember the importance of setting goals and defining what it means to be successful. I begin to shift back to the person that I used to be, believing that I was a 10, I was unstoppable. By the end of LEAP week, I got into the daily habit of