It’s always good to reflect. I find it to be a refreshing and healthy activity. Now that I’m back at college, I have been reflecting on who I am and who I want to be every day, and the way I see things, I have nothing to be ungrateful for. From the perspective of an educated 19-year-old, who comes from a nice neighborhood in Pasadena, California, and now attend school in Maine, I am extremely blessed and lucky to have the life I have. I’m not rich, I have not come to know the world remotely, and I sure don’t have any concrete plans about my future yet, but I live a very good life.

Born and raised Christian, and brought up by two parents who also came from humble backgrounds, I have grown to be grateful for what I have, to never put others down, especially the ones I love. I have also learned to have passion for doing things I highly enjoy and to do my best in every part of my life.

Looking back over my shoulder, I can take away a few valuable lessons I’ve learned I the almost two decades I’ve been alive that I want to share with you today:

Forgive yourself immediately.

This lesson is one I learned in my four years of taking acting during my high school career. This lesson was intensely hammered into us every time our fellow actor would misread a line, arrive late to rehearsal or forget to bring a prop onstage. The actor wouldn’t freak out, throw things everywhere, and curse like a sailor for their incompetent mistake because there was no use in that. Instead, they accepted failure, apologized if needed, and moved on. This lesson seems like it could be applied to much more than acting; however, it wasn’t until I was not physically in my acting space that I could apply this lesson to my life.

During the day at school, I would come to class and realize I left my notebook at home, or I would forget to meet with a teacher or whatever, but I would forgive myself immediately. What’s the point of complaining about what sucks when it doesn’t get you closer to solving the problem? It’s not productive. Sure, there are situations where one needs to mourn, feel a certain emotion and wallow; however, at the end of the day, one needs to pick oneself up. Failure is healthy, and it should be embraced. Failure is not a noun, or something that one can be, it’s an action, and actions can be changed!

Treat others the way you wish to be treated.

I learned this valuable lesson from attending church and from my dad.

I went to Sunday school like any other kid; I wore my floral dresses, doily, white socks, and shiny black shoes only to be bored for 45 minutes in a classroom while incessantly tying and untying my shoelaces. But, I wasn’t always bored, in fact, my favorite part of church was singing worship songs and watching videos about “Being a Good Samaritan.” Sure, my attention span was as short as a any other fidgety child, and I only felt engaged when it required visual and physical stimulation, however, one lesson stuck with me because it was constantly reinforced to myself at church, at home and at school: to treat others with fairness.

My dad was a wonderful man, and treating others with fairness and kindness was his motto. He was the guy to volunteer at a homeless shelter or to help keep our neighborhood safe by stepping up and taking the role as our block captain for three years. He even forced my mom to make an extra plate of food at Thanksgiving so he could drop it off to his homeless friend he met on his work route. My dad was the absolute epitome of being kind to others. I knew him for all of my 18 years, until his unfortunate death the past March (R.I.P Pop), and his motto about being fair and kind to others no matter what was the lesson that kept me going when I felt unloved, unworthy or just plain unhappy. I took that anger inside of me and fueled it towards being kind to others, and as crazy as that sounds, it has blessed me and made me into a better person.

I find that being kind to people around you, whether that form of kindness is lending someone money or shooting them a smile across the room can make the biggest impact on their life. We don’t know what anyone is going through. They could be depressed, hate their job, or they could have just been having the worst day ever. Why treat them badly on top of that because you’re upset too? Be the bigger and better person.

Don’t take anything for granted.

My family has never been rich, but myself and my two siblings were pretty spoiled growing up. I believe the word spoiled means different things for different people: for some it means getting whatever they want, whether that thing is a car for their birthday, or going to a different country every year for vacation. However, being spoiled for me were the little things my parents did for us. They would buy us candy and popcorn at the movies, or take us to Disneyland every few years. But the most valuable thing they gave me was receiving their unconditional love and support every day.

That love and time meant the world to me. Sure, my parents worked hard. We had numerous babysitters and nannies come take care of us when we were really young because my parents had to make ends meet, but every night at dinner, we would sit down, eat and talk about our days. Our highs and lows. The little things matter. Now that I am looking back on my childhood, I realize that I did take those things for granted sometimes. I did expect my parents to be supportive, I never doubted their abilities to put food on the table every night, and I never questioned how much they loved me. But now I know that I should never take love for granted, and shouldn't take anything for granted for that matter. It's hard to see how blessed and fortunate we all are sometimes, and reflection makes it clear.