At age 21 none of us expect to be diagnosed with a stage four cancerous brain tumor that cannot be cured. At age 21 none of us expect to have to fight for our life. At age 21 we don’t expect to have to conquer problems of this complexity. At age 21 we don’t expect to end up being thousands of people’s hero.

I've faced the misfortune of loving someone that had to cross paths with a monster known as cancer, but I was fortunate enough to have known someone who completely changed my life, perspective and who will ultimately forever be my hero.

Liz Lothrop was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia when she was 14 years old in 2008 and reached remission in 2011. The summer of 2015, Liz found out that her cancer had come back in the form of a brain tumor known as Glioblastoma. There are fewer than 200,000 cases a year and a cure for this type of cancer has yet to be found. One can only imagine what it feels like to be told that you’re fighting a losing battle. However, Liz was always a fighter in nearly every aspect of her life.

On Tuesday, May 3^rd, 2016, Elizabeth Lothrop passed away from her battle with cancer, but in my eyes she won this battle in the way she chose to live her life. I like to call these little life excerpts “Life Lessons From Liz."

Liz conquered more in her 21 years than most people will in a lifetime. She had more wisdom and knowledge than any person I have ever known. Liz taught me to not stress over the little things and to always smile no matter what battle God may hand you.

Liz taught me to love and forgive people. Your life can change in the blink of an eye. Unfortunate circumstances happen, which is why it’s important to tell the people you care about how much you really do care for them while they’re still at your reach. As human beings we tend to let our pride get in the way of simply forgiving people. When you lose someone to death, you start to wonder how a person could let a petty problem ruin a friendship or relationship because tomorrow is not guaranteed for anyone. Forgive others while you can. Love others while you can. We also can’t forget to love and forgive ourselves. Our generation gets so caught up in stereotypes and who we are “supposed” to be. We fear too much about what someone else might deem “not cool." You have been given one life with only so many days to live it, so you might as well live it as the person you were meant to be. The most beautiful thing about Liz was that she never once pretended to be someone she was not.

There is, of course, a fine line between forgiving others and letting people walk all over you like a doormat. People will always try and bring you down, which is why it is so important to know your self worth. You cannot allow others to determine your worth for you. I guarantee you that you spend more time worrying about what others think about you than the amount of time that others actually think about you. You are your own worst critic.

As human beings, we will always worry about things that are out of our control. We all have our own set of problems, but Liz taught me to put my problems into perspective. There are going to be times when school stresses us out and times where we might stress over a boy or girl, but at the end of the day we cannot let these minuscule problems control our lives. You cannot let people or things take away your happiness that you’ve worked so hard to create. School is not the end of the world. If a boy or girl broke your heart, at least your heart is still beating and has the opportunity to become stronger than it has ever been. There are not always going to be plenty more days when you can experience the joys of life, which is why we need to experience them every single day and not let trivial things take these joys away from us. You are not always given the perfect hand of cards, but you must play them to your best ability.

Speaking of these joys of life, I never once saw Liz without a smile on her face. This girl had been through it all, but she still chose to smile. When I saw Liz for the first time in a while after one of her surgeries, she couldn’t even walk on her own. At halftime at a high school basketball game, she went out on the court and she stood up out of her wheelchair in front of hundreds of people. There was not a dry eye in the place, but of course Liz was out there and she had that smile on. Elizabeth Lothrop opened my eyes and changed the way I live my life by the way that she chose to live hers. If more people knew her story and her strength, she could continue to change all of our lives. The world deserves to know the kind of person Elizabeth Lothrop was. She was the kind of person that made people better.

We can’t stop any form of tragedy from happening, but we can control how we handle and react to them. In the face of adversity Liz chose to smile, and she chose to be a hero. She is an example of how to live these imperfect lives that we have all been given. I only hope that Liz’s story and her journey can open all of your eyes and inspire you to love and forgive more, love yourself and to not stress or complain so much about the little things. But most importantly, I hope that the next time you face something that tests you, you find the courage to smile through your battle just like Liz did.