Re-evaluating fear
It’s time for everyone in the School to re-evaluate how they approach things that scare them, says Lara (Year 12).
“I think we can all accept that being completely fearless is something that may never be achieved, but something that we will always work towards. Don’t get me wrong, I love our Prefect Initiative and support what we want to achieve within it, but I can also understand how daunting it is to find what it is that scares you most in life and deliberately try to face and fight it.
As much as I want to become someone who is completely carefree and effortless in every action I do, I find the notion itself scary, and at times unachievable. I’m just not built that way. I’m a first child with two younger brothers, and I’m incredibly protective as well as a perfectionist. This combination normally works in my favour, as I have a drive to achieve and love being around people, but it also makes me really hard on myself, and I often feel scared and out of control when things don’t go my way.
My grandmama is someone incredibly close to my heart. She is a woman that has overcome so much in her time on this earth, being pushed away from her religion for being a divorced catholic and raising my mum and uncle as a young single mother. Whenever I call her asking for help, worried or scared about things happening in my life, her favourite quote is: “Only try to control the controllables”. For an overthinker like me, I find it hard to sit back and watch things go wrong that I can’t control, but I know she’s right. I need to start being brave in the face of the unknown, pushing through my uncertainty, moving on, and finding peace within the things that I can control.
Particularly for my year group, I know that we will have all arrived at school today with knots in our stomach for the year ahead of us. I can’t think of a better time for, not just us as Year 12, but everyone in this room to re-evaluate how we approach things that scare us. We can’t control everything that happens in our lives or how others react to things, but one thing we can control is ourselves, being kind to one another. Being fearless does not mean being perfect, and I’d even go as far to say let’s just ‘fear less’, rather than stress about being completely fearless. Everyone has something that scares them, and something that they cannot control. So, let’s go into the last term of this year ready to face challenges and uncertain situations head on together!
Thank you.
Lara (Year 12)
Prefect 2019/2020