How My Passion Brought Me to Harvard

Lukus Stricker reflects on the passion, support, and adversity that led him from his small town wrestling team to the Ivy League varsity.

Five years ago, wrestling was something I did for fun, and Harvard was a school I never dreamed I could go to. Today, I’m a varsity athlete for a university that many would consider the best in the world. I wake up every day and have no choice but to count my blessings. The number of sacrifices people have made to get me where I am is countless, and while I’ve had to make sacrifices of my own they pale in comparison to the support I’ve had along the way.

Wrestling, for me, is so special because it is whatever you make of it. I was an unathletic and uncoordinated kid, and I tried a lot of sports throughout my life that I was just awful at. I played football for a year, but my mom made me quit because I was so small. I tried track and cross country but ultimately realized that I just hated running. No matter how many sports I played, I always knew that wrestling was where I could shine. It’s not about how strong or fast you are, it’s about who works the hardest and who throws himself entirely into the sport. I recognized this at a young age, and as I got older I began to play fewer different sports because I realized that it was best for me to pour all my effort into the one that I might succeed in. I never knew that the sport would be able to carry me as far as it has, and I have wrestling to thank for the outstanding individuals that I find myself surrounded by daily.

The the community that I interact with inspire me to no end. I’m surrounded by people who are dedicated to the highest level, and that have all come from different and incredible walks of life. What’s really special about Harvard is that the outsiders’ perspective of Harvard students rarely rings true. Of course, there are privileged people who been handed things for most of their life. There are also kids that knew they would go there someday and do nothing but lock themselves in their rooms and study because that’s all they’ve ever known. But the vast majority of students at Harvard are people who never knew that they would be there, and that have overcome endless obstacles to find themselves in the position that they are today. Harvard amazes me every day because it is incredibly diverse not only ethnically, but diverse in experiences. Nobody I go to school with is like anybody else I’ve ever met, and I’m forced to grow on a daily basis as I learn more and more about them.

But while being a student at Harvard is an incredible privilege, at times it can be very isolating. When I committed to wrestle at Harvard my senior year, it felt like everybody’s perspective of me changed. I wasn’t the hardest working student, and I went to a school where many people’s primary focus was academics. Where the top students in my class made sacrifices in the classroom, I made sacrifices on the wrestling mat. A lot of people held grudges against me because they felt I wasn’t deserving of going to such a prestigious school, and on the day I committed I felt I had been labeled “the Harvard kid.” I was called by admissions right before I walked into my government class, and my teacher made some comment about me being late. When my friend asked why I was late, I told him, and he stood up and yelled, “everyone, Lukus just got into Harvard!” While everyone clapped and gave me congratulations, I could tell that a lot of people’s opinions of me had entirely changed.

I still struggle with this today. Whenever I meet new people, it feels like I can only dance around the subject for so long. One of the first questions people typically ask me is where I go to school, and when I tell them the truth it feels like the conversation has ended before it began. All people want to ask me is how hard it is, and all people want to tell me is how crazy it is that I go there. It can feel like nobody wants to get to know me, and a lot of people make assumptions about me simply because of where I go to school.

I’m a first-generation college student. I grew up in a small town in Ohio in a middle-class family. Despite all this, I had parents that were ready and willing to fully invest themselves in all of my interests, and somehow I found myself where I am today. My story is one that most people are shocked by, but for better or for worse, most people will never know it. Everything has its pros and cons, and while being a student at Harvard has endless pros, the cons can really be frustrating at times. It can be very difficult to make genuine connections with people when I first meet them because they only want to talk about Harvard. They take my school at the surface level, and they draw assumptions about me without bothering to ask how I actually got there.

I’m not sure if there’s an underlying message in what I’ve written. To this point, I’ve just been trying to explain the complexities of my life in 1000 words. But if there is a message, I suppose it’d be this: find what you’re truly passionate about and commit yourself entirely to it. Wrestling was an outlet for me that nothing else could be. It gave me something that I finally felt I could succeed in, and it gave me an escape from the real world. No matter what was going on in my life, when I went to practice I could forget everything and just focus on having fun, working hard, and getting better. Everyone has this escape, whether its a sport, art, music, writing, anything. We all have an escape. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. And if you have, don’t let it go. I was lucky enough that I found my outlet early, and I was even luckier that it carried me to the heights that it did. Chase your dreams, keep your nose to the grindstone, and make sure you have fun while you do it.

To keep up with Lukus, you can follow him on Twitter here!

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