future BYU alumnus? odd

Sections about myself, my educational goals, other plans, my process in choosing BYU (my gratitude for the scholarship). These come due to a thank-you letter requirement, for my scholarship, with each section confined by a 1500 character limit. I need one of those, obviously, or these may have waxed much more aimless. Still, there are things I'd have liked to include, but won't add retroactively.

• About Me

I love to take a photo every day. It's a habit I picked up when my best friends—honorary brothers, and my real brother too—graduated without me. I realized how little I had of them, with a year of high school still to make it through without them. I'm grateful for what I learned from their absence as well as their active friendships.

My four little siblings have given me much of my character—something I am quick to remember when I leave them but not always otherwise. My three older siblings I look up to more than anything; I cherish time and banter with each. I'm grateful for all my siblings and for my wise parents, who have shaped us all with what I'd consider great success.

I overuse hyphens.

I am something of a word nerd, and scarcely a day goes by where I don't bust out the Merriam-Webster app. I like to look up words that I already know, for the nuance of it. I like when I get to look up words I don't already know, too.

I love to analyze and dissect things around me. Doubly fun if with one of my older brothers.

I love to keep a journal, and have two or three in consistent use. One for brief logging and organization of days, mostly. Another, in much longer standing, for study and pondering. Journals become my companions, and, like the photo habit, stand me well long down the road.

I really like to push the boundaries of what I know and do. But I am lazy, too. I try to maintain a balance, with an emphasis to the former when I can. And I've become a hard worker.

• Educational Goals

Primarily, in my life and education, I want for myself contentment with the work I have done and the paths I have chosen. I'll never forget what a cousin told me: "Happiness is when you are the person you want to be." I want to be a person who doesn't forget hard work simply because the easier way is so visible. It's one of my biggest follies, apathy; it scares me to think of what I may miss for it. So I work against that.

Obviously, I intend to begin my life-living and liberal arts education at BYU. And I so look forward to that. In all honesty, I find myself a bit nervous for the workload I have; in wanting to pick classes I felt I may find passion in, I'm left with mostly more difficult coursework. I have been lucky (and consider myself blessed) to have the sort of brain that makes school a breeze, which should perhaps soothe my nerves about my schedule. Conversely, maybe I will just finally have to learn study habits that aren't just the Pomodoro method of 25 minutes on, 5 minutes off.

I will learn as much as I can about life and the world around me. I will attend BYU with an open mind, and pursue as much education as I can. I want to earn more than a bachelor's degree, however that fits in with my finances and my hope of forming a family. Because I don't know yet what I want to major in (too thoroughly enjoy too many things), my major goal for the moment is guidance along that path. What a scary, fun, ride regardless.

• Future Plans

In no particular presumed chronology:
I want to create a family. I want to get married—but not too soon. But not much later, either, than I learn someone whom I love, and whom I trust to choose emotional growth in difficult stretches on this road of life, and whom I want to build my life with. I have to trust the Lord to help confirm a decision that will ultimately lead me to happiness. I look forward to that time in my life. But not too soon.

A mission, too, is something I so look forward too. The idea of a mission is nerve-wracking. And, I know, harder than I can know until I am there. But I want it, and prepare for it every day. In a summer, or two, I will likely be in the field, called of God to consecrate my daily life in His service as a full-time missionary. And that is a thought I relish. I hope I am ready—not too weighted by thoughts of how I could be better. Instead, happy as I am, close enough to being the flawed person I want to be.

And I plan to explore. I think I could live anywhere for a season or a year, and want to in many different sorts of places. That may begin in summers between my full-time education, or it may be later. But it is certainly part of the plan.

• Gratitude

It takes a long time to decide what to write here.

I was fully prepared to attend the U of U. I had a roommate and housing contracts; I had full tuition, only with housing money too; I had an (admittedly peon work) part-time job lined up in a medical research field; I had amazing research programs in whatever STEM-oriented field I wound up choosing.

Then it was almost May, and I was changing my mind. Such an idiotic thing it seemed. Having second thoughts in May. Just antsy feet, right? And I'd be happy at either school, so it shouldn't even matter. Why so much indecision over two wins?

I took a leap.
And I chose BYU. I chose a school that I have never been drawn to, a school that I have always felt cynical toward, that would suddenly require rent money of me, that did not have everything lined up just so.
And... a school that had my older brother and sister.
A school with the rigorous education I wanted.
A school that required me to trust my feelings to be promptings from the Spirit.
A school that required me to be humble.

This scholarship is like so many from schools who look at the numbers by my name, my statistics, and want me to be where they are. I never forget that realm of choice, especially steeped as I am in a world that places so much emphasis on the power to choose. But I'm most grateful for this scholarship, for this opportunity, because it is now my life. I'm grateful that the place I've chosen is choosing me, too. Thank you for investing in us. Thank you.