LossVsSuccess

Can Loss Be More Important Than Success? (or something like that)

This essay got a score of 6

Despite common misconception, true success lies in the journey, not the destination. The journey to victory has its ups and down, losses and gains, but that’s is where one truly learns and benefits. Literature is fertile with an endless stream of encounters where characters come across great loss only to learn the best of lessons.

In John Green’s novel The Fault In Our Stars, the protagonist Hazel lives under the fear of death. Through her battle with cancer, she tries to distance herself from the people around her, thinking she was doing them a favor. Hazel thought that the less time she spends with those who love her, the easier it would be for them when cancer eventually wins the battle and kills her. When Hazel meets and mutually falls in love Augustus, a cancer survivor, she uselessly tries to lessen their encounters, avoiding unnecessarily encounters with him. Later, Hazel and Augustus find out that a new type of cancer spread into Gus’s body, and, unfortunately, it only took a few days until he dies. Through the heartbreak and remorse, Hazel learned that a person fearing death while living is a person dying every single day. Losing Augustus taught Hazel the most important lesson and helped her look into the world with clearer, less gloomy perception.

Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho perhaps represents the best example for this argument. Veronika is beautiful, young, and rich; she has friends and a loving family. Still, Veronika feels hollow deep inside, and decides to commit suicide. She ingests huge amounts of different medicines, writes a death npt, and waits. Veronika, to her surprise, wakes up in a mental rehab and is informed that although her suicide attempt did not work, it has weakened her heart so much that she is expected to only live for a couple more weeks. During her stay in the mental institution, Veronika meets a group of people and gets to hear their stories. She grows fond of them and finds true love within the arms of Eduard, a schizophrenic patient. During her last days, she explores true meanings of friendships and their extends. Even though Veronika dies, her soul finds peace for she leaves this world with answered questions and quenched desires.

Hazel and Veronika weren’t the first, and surly are not the last,who truly understood and were able to use the power of loss to turn up the curtains that blurred their visions of the world. Afterall, grief does not change you, it reveals you!

-Aya Adel

True Hero

Graded Homework

SAT Essay

Assignment:

Should heros be defined as people who say what they think when we ourselves lack the courage to say it?

I Got a 6 on this one too..

Although no one would argue that Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, and all those other iconic leaders are heros, the term “hero” changes from a person to another. What a hero truly means is a person that does not only speak his or her mind, but also courageously acts upon it.

During Abraham Lincoln’s time, slavery was a major crisis. African Americans were enslaved and stripped out of every shred of dignity. They were treated in the most inhumane ways. Abraham always had strong views against this action, but he knew talk was cheap. Therefore, Lincoln aspired to be a president who could achieve change. Once president, it wasn’t long before he banished slavery and segregation. Thanks to Abraham Lincoln, racial inequality is considered a taboo.

In Stephenie Meyer’s The Host, Wanderer is a Soul who, just like all other Souls, had to live within a Host and live off what its world has to offer. When Wanderer reached Earth, she noticed that earthlings had a mind of their own, and that, on that planet, hosts were parasites. Wanderer found herself getting fond to a community of rebellious, Soul-free humans. She strove to gain their trust and understand that she wasn’t like the other souls, but the humans wouldn’t believe her talks. She decided that to gain respect, actions had to accompany her words. Wanderer started helping the humans develop their community, and soon she was their hero.

As history and literature make it obvious, to be a true hero you have to not only talk the talk, but also walk the walk. Saying that the only reason Abraham Lincoln or Wanderer were entitled as heros is only that they were courageous enough to say what we can’t is a disintegration of their heroic deeds.

Aya Adel

Questioning Authorities

SAT Writing Homework

        This Essay Got a Score of 6

Questioning Authorities

People in authority always appear to be smarter, more reasonable, and more sensible, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they actually are. Questioning the ideas and decisions of those in power enforces equality among the people and their leaders as well as it sets  a field for improving previous regimes.

The people of France always knew they were abused and betrayed by their governments, but they chose not to defy it. The taboo of questioning those in power was, to them, more important than actually gaining their rights. Had the people never stepped outside their comfort zone and challenged those figures, their freedom would have never been won. “Never do anything against conscience, even if the state demands it”, said the wise Albert Einstein.

In Eragon, the people of Alagaesia hid in secret communities because they could not face the unjust rule and tyranny of The King. When Eragon and Roran went up to The King to confront him, they find out that he is nothing but a coward living on the fear of his people. The king had illusioned his people into thinking he is all powerful and great; that was what he led them to think, not what he truly was.

Those who hold a higher rank, whether politically, economically, in a workplace, or even in a school, might be there for a reason; perhaps they actually deserve to be there. But even that doesn't mean that they are unquestionable; everyone makes mistakes. Questioning those in power, if done respectfully, only sets them on the right track.

Video

The First Seven Years

I found this very helpful.. Hope you do too.

The Catcher in the Rye

The Catcher in the Rye

     Of all the stories I've read, I think this one had quite a lasting effect on me. The thing is, though, the author doesn't thoroughly "end" the story; it has one of those "Write your own ending" conclusion. Now a lot of books end that way, except this one is vary vague, and if you checked the reviews on it, you can barely find two similar ones. I think that the fact that the author was able to imply such an effect proves his undeniable strength and power of word.

     In my point of view, I believe that Holden had changed to the better. After all, he does confess in the beginning that he has almost stopped smoking, and in the end Caulfield hints that he would start applying himself to school and what not.

     As a teenager, I did appreciate the book and the themes that it discussed. The book was the wake-up call I truly needed. I do recommend it for it helps getting through depression, at least i know it helped me quite a decent much.

I think I would compare it to Perks of Being a Wallflower. It goes with that genre of self-exposure and the finding of one's identity. Although I liked it a great deal, I would not compare it to The Little Prince. I might do a review on that one some other time.