LOOKING OUT
The ocean has always flown through the veigns of my family and I. The smell of the salty ocean lingering in the air. There you hear the sound of the roaring waves crashing against the feathery sand in your ears. The tide rushing in and out, in and out, pressing against the beach, causing it to get smaller and smaller. As a little girl looking out into a canvas of perfectly painted sky and royal blue ocean, I always wanted to be a part of the magnificent portrait of art displayed before me. An ocean of fears containing all sorts of things to be scared of, yet one that held so much beauty and eminence. Watching all the other people venture into the ambience of blue granted courage to me, who always wanted to live and breathe anything ocean. I was always the child who looked ahead to what was next, always fantasizing about the future and what it held. However, that also made me, as I grew up, look ahead to all the circumstances that could potentially go wrong planting the seed of fear in my life. Fear is a seed that grows and grows inside you even if nothing “terrible” ever really happened to you. It’s like the picture above: you can stay on the beach and fear what might happen if you press into the water, or you can go into the water like the surfers and ignore the “what if’s” and enjoy life.
CONTROLLING FEAR
Ever since I can remember I have always struggled with fear. Fear of enormous sharks or fear of what other people think of me. Fear seeks to be a constant companion in life. There are two different kinds of fears, healthy and unhealthy fear. It is good and natural to have a healthy fear of the ocean to give you caution. However, it turns unhealthy when you never set foot in the ocean because of your anxiety. So many times I miss out on marvelous experiences because of my fear. I have had many conversations with my parents about forgetting my fears and living my life fearless. I am someone who hates to miss out on things yet I miss out on so much because of the fear holding me back. Fear is like the tide of an ocean. One day it comes in and consumes everything in its’ path and the next day the tide is out and doesn’t affect us. We don’t realize the fear in our life until it consumes everything in and around us. What I’m learning is that I can’t let fear control my life because I want to live free from fear.

CROSSING OUR BRIDGES
The future will forever be like a prolonged bridge towering over a dangerously vibrant ocean to me. In order to get to the future you have to cross the strenuous bridge of life teetering over the large body of water waiting to swallow you up. That bridge may have obstacles just as real bridges do. There are traffic jams, accidents, berserk people, erratic drivers, and always the danger of falling off the bridge and collapsing into a deep seaway. Relating it back to life, we have to face obstacles in everyday. We live just to get to the next day. Yet through it all there are both hardships and great rewards. Living, in itself, is a great reward that we should all strive to do well. All my life I have been one to look ahead and greatly anticipate the future, always looking ahead to what’s next. I was always the kid daydreaming in class about the person I’ll be when I’m older, and all the new people who will come into my life. Now as I’m growing up I realize the future comes faster than I could have ever thought. I am crossing my bridge faster than I necessarily want to with no ability to control the flow of traffic. One day you’re in your mother’s arms as an infant, and the next thing you know you’re in a retirement home. Life comes and goes, things fade, people come and go, but as long as you stay on your bridge, and power through those obstacles, you will excel further than you could have ever imagined and the view will be spectacular.