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Perspective by meg hughes
W
aking up, I used to think about how my day might turn out. I used to hope that no one would look at me in the hallways and that the teacher wouldn’t call on me in class. I wanted to blend in and not seem too loud, too quiet, or too different. However, this was all before attending Leaders for Life International summer program. School and education hasn’t always been my thing. High school as a whole was not always my thing. During my freshman year, I wasn’t involved in school activities because I thought no one would want me to be there. I was afraid to meet new people that were older than me that might not like me. I was afraid to be my potential me. From the outside, I appeared to have decent grades, friends, and a good personality; however, that was only from an external point of view. For me, high school created pressure—pressure to have good grades, pressure about colleges, pressure to be in a clique with the “coolest” people, and constantly being pressured to do drugs, alcohol, or party in general. High school was about being in sports, musicals, relationships, and being well28
liked. High school appeared to be everything. In high school, people forget that the small problems we face are nothing in comparison to what is going on in the real world. People would talk for days about a person’s party or who got suspended from school. In the moment, it all seemed so important. But in the bigger picture, none of that really was. Hardly anyone can look past high school and know exactly what they want their future to be like. In the meantime, high school seemed like forever. Four years was equivalent to a lifetime in my eyes. Little did I know that one presentation by Teresa at L4L would change the way I looked at high school forever. Teresa did a presentation at camp where she stretched out a tape measure, eighty inches long, signifying the average lifespan of eighty years. As she stretched the tape measure across the outdoor deck, she shared how the power of a moment in high school can influence a life and reminded us of the power we have as leaders to be conscious of what we say and how we treat others. The power of a comment resonates within each person long after