My whole life I have always been told to be guided by your inspiration and allow your inspiration to transition into dreams. After all, with hard work and dedication, anything is possible. Isn’t is funny, though, how as you get older, people will start telling you to “be more realistic” or “you know, that is a wonderful vision, BUT do you have a backup plan?”

A lot of times, this big dreaming applies to things in the arts and entertainment industry. If a kid grows up saying “I want to be a doctor,” or “I want to be a teacher,” people will say things like “Oh, that is wonderful! After all, we will always need teachers and doctors.” However, when you play a little role reversal on the situation to kids saying things like “I want to be a singer,” “I want to be an actor,” or even “I want to be a quarterback in the NFL,” people begin to get judgmental. Although I am realistic - in that I knew from a young age I would never be a singer because I was definitely not blessed with Beyoncé's breathtaking vocals - I do believe in finding something you love because it will give you a purpose and leave you feeling continually inspired.

As a kid, I grew up a non-athletic intellect who had a bursting desire and passion for art. I would spend hours crafting, coloring and drawing with my grandma, always grinning ear to ear because I was so happy. At that point in my life, I was determined to be an artist. Well, that only lasted until about third-grade. Reason being, third to fourth-grade was about the time I discovered theater. I was pretty set on wanting to become an actor. The stage was where I felt I got to be myself. I could act as stupid as I wanted, people would watch, and more so, people would laugh and enjoy themselves. I was so invested into acting that my parents put me into multiple theater camps, and I even signed up for one of those tacky online talent agencies who told us their most successful client was essentially an extra/backup dancer on "Glee". Anyways, I loved acting, it was the light of my life.

Well, flashback to fifth grade. I was pumped for sixth-grade because I was going to get to be in theater for the first time. I told my fifth-grade teacher that one day I wanted to be an actor. She chuckled and said, “Good luck with that.” I sort of also remember her saying something along the lines of “You’ll never make it,” but can’t remember exactly. As an aspiring 10-year-old actor, to hear those words in general - especially hearing them from my teacher, someone who is supposed to encourage me - left me crushed and devastated, hence why she made my list of least favorite teachers ever.

Well, I turned around and decided because she said that, I was going to work even harder to get what I wanted. I always told myself that when I win my Oscar one day, I would give my thank you speech and at the end of it say, “Take that Ms. S, look at me now.” So, in a way, she boosted my confidence by making me try harder than ever before. I acted all throughout middle school, and during one of my UIL performances, the theater directors from the high school I was about to attend called me over to where they were sitting, introduced themselves, applauded me on my performance, and personally told me how excited they were that I was going to be a student of theirs the upcoming year. Sadly, high school is where I had my acting downfall. I don’t know what happened in those two years I was in theater, but after tenth-grade, I was no longer allowed to participate in the acting program. After theater, I ended up transitioning into a love for journalism, photography, and videography. However, those activities never even came close to my desire to be an actor, yet those two teachers were two of the best teachers I have ever had in my life, mostly because they were there when I needed them.

So in conclusion, thank you. Thank you to all the people that knocked me down in life, because in the end, it made me stronger. I know that I will always have a love for theatre, you have no idea how many times I’ve tweeted about wishing I could’ve stayed in the program with people replying, “well why’d you quit,” while my reply never hit their Twitter notifs because I didn't want to rehash my broken dreams. #Firstworldproblems, am I right? But anyways, people will always try to knock you down but it is up to you to bring yourself back up. And in the wise words of Taylor Swift,

“Someday I'll be living in a big ole city
And all you're ever gonna be is mean…"