Despite spending half of Winter Ball doing karaoke, singing as loud as possible with friends with the sunroof open after Pinkout and being a generally loud person, I’ve surprisingly never lost my voice. Obviously, I’ve woken up countless times with a stuffy nose and sore throat, realizing I should have been grateful the night before for my ability to breathe.
But, I believe that if I gaslight myself into thinking I’m not sick, I won’t be. It’s like telling yourself a grade doesn’t matter – like, is that 10/20 in Lang really going to do anything?
While maybe that’s terrible medical and scholarly advice, almost anything you learn can be applied to everyday life (although I’m not fully sure what I’ll use matrices for in Hollywood). By that logic, my pseudo-sickness is really saying, if you don’t believe in yourself, who says others will?
Like I said, I’ve never gotten laryngitis, but I’ve also never lost my metaphorical voice: I’ve never backed down from an opinion, hid part of my identity or reinvented myself so others like me more.
Don’t underestimate people, yet at the same time, don’t underestimate yourself: if I had a glow-up since freshman year, it wasn’t because of new clothes or because I did my hair, it’s because of confidence. It takes a lot of strength to look in the mirror every morning and realize that, if you feel bad right now, imagine what school air is going to do to you! But, to the seniors, whom I’ve seen growing up, juniors I’ve found through music, my sophomores from French 3H and even younger classes that I’ve never properly met, I know that you have that strength. Every one of you has put in time and effort and passion into your pursuits, so it’s only right that you believe you can keep going.
Life is challenging and ruthless – if you can believe it, even worse than going to bed feeling a little off, waking up Tuesday morning with a blocked nose and awful headache, and then having to sit through the AP HuG exam at 8 am.
Thankfully, we have a choice: hide from the pressures, or face them head on. Finding your voice may not be giving speeches or getting on stage for the talent show; in fact, it doesn’t even need to be public. Discover what intrigues you, what you’re good at and what you enjoy doing. Explore your interests, and express that to the world; there’s someone out there that wants to hear what you have to say.
