Who do I want to be?

This is a question that doesn’t have one answer. It is a question whose answer will change through time and circumstance.

At the moment I live life as a teenager and student. I want to do well in school and have fun with my friends. I want to enjoy this time and spend time with my family.

When I look forward I dream of living a life filled with travel, adventure and learning.  Where I meet new people and challenge myself to do new things and exert independence. I want to grow and challenge myself. I want to take a gap year and travel through Europe. I want to go to university and start learning the skills I need for my career.

To do these things I need to be a person who is brave and strong, confident and kind.  I need to reflect on who I am and what I want.  I need to learn my strengths and weaknesses and learn how to shore up those weaknesses with knowledge.  I need to find people who I admire and emulate the traits that I admire.

I want to be a person who can take risks and be successful and also be kind. 

Someone that inspires me is a man I read about in The Sun Does Shine called Anthony Ray Hinton, he was a man who was falsely accused of murder (because he was black) and sentenced to death row. Despite all that had happened to him he stayed true to his belief’s, he stayed kind and decided to help the people around them. He started a book club to help his fellow inmates find a little bit of joy, a flicker of light in the dark. After 30 years of fighting, he finally won and got out of death row, but at the same time had lost the most precious thing.

The reason that I was so inspired by him is because even in his  darkest moments, he refused to act like anything but himself. He refused to act like a killer because he wasn’t one, he refused to stop helping the people around him even when they were in hell on earth. He had lots of grit and perseverance and those are the characteristics that I want to strive for. 

Another person that I inspire to be like is my granny. I had an interview with her where she talked about her life, she’s very active and I inspire to be like her when I grow older. I wrote about the highlights of our interview and gave reasons to why she inspires me. 

In the first clip my granny is telling me about how she ran a 5k in her late 60’s. I found this inspiring because when people get older their health and fitness usually declines significantly. My granny has put in time and effort to staying fit and healthy into her older ages.

In the second clip my granny describes some of her experience growing up after World War II. I found this inspiring because even when her childhood was probably significantly harder for her than people in this generation she still talked about her experience in a positive way and not about how it negativity affected her.

In the third clip my granny’s talking about how the principal of the school wanted her to come back quickly after having a child. This makes me think that she was extremely high valued at her job and she was one of the best teachers. I find it inspiring that she found a job that suits her so well and she excels at while still enjoying it and being able to live her outside life without it interfering. I want to find a job that I enjoyed as much as my granny liked hers.

In the last clip my granny is telling me about her busy schedule and what she does with her life even after being retired. I strive to be have this kind of active lifestyle that my granny has. Instead of just staying in her house all the time she likes to keep herself busy with friends and community activities even though she is getting older (Almost 80 now). She talks about how she is helping out people at the community centre and likes to drive people around. She also told me about her hobbies like gardening, and walking in her local park. I inspire to have this positive mentality on life even as I grow in age.

While doing this project everyday, we would all wrote something we’re grateful for on a post it note and we would stick it on a window. I realized that many things in my life I take for granted, I live an extremely lucky life and I need to think about what I’m grateful for more often. The post-it window ended up looking so good in our class room, it was a pop of colour and kindness.

Thank you for reading and dear future me, I hope you completed all your goals and are living your fullest life.