Choices

3. What is the best advice you ever received? Why? And did you follow it? (University of Pennsylvania)

The best advice I ever received was to “take control of my own life,” and I did. I was in the midst of divorcing parents and was being shipped from one house to the next every now and then. They wanted to settle by mutual consent, but nothing seemed mutual about it, and my brother and I were being dragged through it. So while talking to a close, almost motherly figure in my life, she advised me to do the above, and not let my parents’ actions affect my life and my choices.

Listening to her was the best decision I made at that point. I disregarded everything my parents had between them and decided to do what was best for me, and my future. If I didn’t make the right decision now, then I would suffer for the rest of my life. This is when I decided on changing schools and moving to Woodstock School was the best option for me. Living with my father, I wasn’t able to move around and find transport to do any extra-curricular activities. Having only work to do and nothing else, I started neglecting my work, never got more than 4 hours of sleep a night, and was extremely unhappy. With my exams coming up, I took a call and asked my father whether I could go up to Mussoorie to stay with my mother and study however much I could for the last 3 weeks. When I got up to Mussoorie, I had the house to myself with no distractions whatsoever and for the first time in my life, I actually enjoyed studying. I used to study all day while my mom was away, spend time with her once she got back at 6 or 7 p.m., and most importantly got at least 13 hours of sleep a night.
Taking control of my own life helped me come into a better environment, improved my relationship with my father as he now makes a bigger effort to communicate. It has also put me in a better situation to improve my grades.

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