Letter to Myself

Dear Self,

As you have grown all these years, you have been through many different styles of learning and experiences, often times they contradict each other and leaving you confused and frustrated in trying to find the answer. But in the process you have been too afraid to look into yourself for these answers, you have to know that your opinions matter just as much as anyone else. Being afraid of what the outcome will be is only natural at first because there's always a risk in any advancement in your life. But you are still 20 years old, still an age where you can make mistakes and learn from them before it's too late. Look at those 30, 40, even 70 year old people sitting in your classes, although you don't know why they're there, maybe they are there to finally get the education they need, or perhaps they just love learning, but you know that your goals at those ages don't consist of going to classes with a bunch of teenagers. So get your mistakes and confusion about life out of the way now before they manifest much later on in your life. You know what you want and how to get them if only you treat yourself as you would treat anybody else, so why not take that step and truly change yourself the way you've always imagined yourself to be? You have wandered long enough, and it's time you start reaching for those goals that you've set for yourself and finally be happy. The world is not that terrifying of a place. Everyone else, no matter how intimidating they are, are still just people, made of flesh and bones, and breathes the same air as you. They have a heart, a brain, and the five senses, so they can feel, can think, and experience things if you allow them to. This weekend at Estes Park, you and a few other guys decided to sit with this old couple who were there for the Scottish Festival for breakfast, thinking this is kind of awkward and unnatural at first, you started the conversation with the basics, but you ended up with knowledge about a few secrets about the underground scene of our government. How would I have known that? Imagine if you had done that earlier in your life, imagine how much more interesting things you would have learned and understand about the world if you had just done things instead of being intimidated and fear the awkwardness that could ensue. Learn from stories, learn from observation, confidence is something that you have always lacked. Learn to obtain it, practice, fail, re-evaluate and practice, fail again, practice more, and finally you will succeed. And that is somewhere I hope to see you in the future.


Nick Zhou
09/2009