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TRIALS AND LESSONS: A SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL EXPERIENCE | By: Lourenzo Manimtim

 

        In the Garment Capital of the Philippines of Taytay, Rizal in a school named Siena College of Taytay there is a boy in Senior High, studying this today until the very day, this boy has fun and plays. After all, Senior High is the place one shall taste, the challenge of life, and be prepared for the future’s fate.

Senior High School (SHS) is the phase of a student’s life where students are prepared. Their talents and specialized skills are being honed and developed in preparation for college and their future career in the real world. Students who graduated from Grade 10 may choose the strand of their liking and pick the course that is best suited for them. The stage of senior high school life is important as it serves as a transition between the boundaries of their past and of their future. It sets the stage for future possibilities to soar on and pursue greater heights.

As of writing this essay, I am currently a Grade 12 senior high school HUMSS (Humanities and Social Sciences) student at Siena College of Taytay. As a Grade 12 graduating senior high school student, I have faced and overcome many challenges and trials during my school career. Challenges in school and in my personal life have put my strength, skills, and my emotions, and mind at their wit end. And in those experiences, I have learned a lot of things that had made a long-lasting impact and made a mark on my life. Specifically, in the last three (3) months of my SHS 2022 experience, from the third month of the year until May.

In these periods, I have embarked on the most grueling and challenging moments and memories that are still ongoing in my SHS life that had put me in the lowest points and hardest of breakdowns; I am currently a part of a very stressful professional mind-intensive academic competition, My Dad is diagnosed with an incurable disease and is in dialysis that is possible to be forever, we are in a steep bad financial situation and lastly, I am extremely distressed, I am having trouble in managing my situation right now due to stacks and stacks of problems and responsibility that I am not used to. It’s like a game, I see that the problems that I have today are far too above my league. It is extremely heavy for me that in many cases I have tripped and fallen, gotten chained, and gotten slowed. I have been battling myself now, my mind and memory are not in a good state. The way I do things, especially like what is happening right, I have far too wasted my time, I have missed lots of opportunities and I work on things far too slow. And this is not simply a realization of oneself but rather also the culmination of observation of the people around seeing how I act like how my dad told me that “Even if you have the greatest quality and experience, it means nothing if you lack productivity”. This is a problem that I am aware of since the beginning but have difficulty addressing it. I realize that I am far too limited and in my current situation I am still weak. However, I know that I am strong, but I cannot just leave the thought that I feel that when I motivate myself — I only keep on lying instead.

But even in these hard times and soul-breaking moments. I always remember in my mind that I should never lose any hope because if hope is lost then what will it be for my future?  In these difficult moments I cope and deal with my problems, I rose, develop new tactics and stand on my ground and take on the ravaging storms and achieve a champion’s victory. The battlefield has changed, if in the past I am on the battle of Thermopylae, right now, I am in Vietnam engaging in guerilla warfare, the warzone is unconventional, and this is very unpredictable. It is better to say that I am promoted from my past life and today my life had stepped to another level. It has become more dynamic, and more complex compared to the linear way how my problems work in the past. In a nutshell, there are more problems and responsibilities I am being challenged with today.

Nevertheless, during these times I have realized many things about myself in my limitations and my weaknesses and how I repeatedly failed to address and make changes. I have learned that every challenge has a purpose as it is God’s plan. I must consider ensuring quality work in the shortest time (maximum productivity in great quality) because whenever I work on things like this essay, I tend to take it as overbearing and work with my tasks longer than it is supposed to be and when that happens the longer I do things the quality deteriorates and put great stress and burden in my mind and body because in the mix of your current problems there is that parasitic task that puts burden in you that you should have done two weeks ago.

Next, I learned that I need to see my challenges as an inspiration and not a great burden. I often see my task as a burden that drags me down though I know it is my responsibility and it is not right. Most of the time when I do this, I fail to assess the real difficulty of the task. Therefore, failing to manage my time, resulted in many missing tasks. At the same time, when I see or mistake the challenge as very hard, I overthink and become slow in working things because I feel that it is very hard. I have that tendency to overthink and see my problems as harder than they should be “Sometimes the fear of doing something is more difficult than the task itself” It is significant that I need to change my mindset if I want to succeed in my life. Overthinking and seeing my task as a burden is not good with time management as it just slows me down. I must use it as inspiration if I want to go beyond my limits and achieve my dreams.

Lastly, overcome yourself and defeat your defeat. In those experiences, I have also realized the strengths that I am strong, and I can really do it! But at the same time, I have been humbled by my limitations, I lack the skills, I lack the brainpower needed, I am impulsive, impatient, and slow, I forget things and I am very lazy. And these factors are what drag me down in my life dealing with my challenges.  But overall, I have my fair share of strengths and weaknesses and it takes discipline, perseverance, and action to get and achieve your dream. If you really want to become someone in the future, then you have the responsibility to work on it and don’t stop. And at the same time, learn from your mistakes and use them to become a much greater person and defeat your inadequacies. I need to defeat my slowness in things for I believe that the law of the jungle is Matira ang Matibay!

Challenges in life are there for a purpose, If I did not accept those challenges, I wouldn’t be here today strong and smiling. If I didn’t take upon those challenges, I will regret the choices I made. I will be very depressed and sulk with bad emotions. I will become distressed and distraught, but it won’t make me a weaker person. For the pains that I have experienced there may be scars but only make me tougher and stronger. There are negative and bad times during those experiences like anxiety and breakdowns. Nevertheless, there are more positive things from the side of those challenging experiences. The trials that have hardened and broken me have made a positive yet also a negative bearing on me. It is positive because I have realized the things I need to improve from my strengths and weaknesses and negative because it’s kind of physically and mentally affected me. I know as I said again and again that challenges are there for a purpose and we cannot neglect the negative effects of these challenges. In the final moments now, I feel like I am hanging on a tightrope, my mind is dizzy, and my body feels lazy and very tired. Although I undergo these negative side effects I can’t stop because if I stop then nothing won’t change, and I will just stay the same, a normal and an average person. I am an excellent person, what I am having today is a process of breakthrough testing my body and mind, my will, perseverance, and determination.

I am 18 years old, and I think that the challenges that I was exposed to in the last 3 months of my SHS 2022 life were a great opportunity. It is rare for Senior High School Students those the same age as me to receive the same benefits as I have. What I want to be in the future is a great profession, I aim to become an International Lawyer and a Filipino business magnate. And with the training and the experience, I have accumulated during my trials. It had awoken and prepared me for the possible challenges that I will face in the future. There are moments in times when I just want to give up and rest I try to cope and make excuses to justify my problems. I think that what I have endured is very difficult and a notable personal achievement. “Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.” (Victor Frankl). Enjoy your life! And conquer your challenges! Always stay safe! And Blessed Be God Forever!

 

 

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