<p>I'm kind of stubborn and opposed the common dogma that I should cite something from history, and not over-involve my personal life. Anyways, here are the prompt and essay, respectively:</p>
<p>Think carefully about the issue presented in the following excerpt and the assignment below.</p>
<p>If we valued honesty, we would be willing to risk our jobs to become whistleblowers and tell truths that our employers did not want revealed. If we valued success, we would give up our free time in order to excel in a subject or sport. In other words, the sacrifices we are willing to make reveal what we care about the most.
Assignment:
Can what we value be determined only by what we sacrifice? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.
Whenever one devotes himself to a duty or activity, the sacrifices that come with it stick out like a sore thumb. Personal values always come at the expense of something else, whether it be money, prestige, or most commonly time to pursue these values. Time, unfortunately, can be the most valuable sacrifice of all.
My outlook in life has changed considerably in the past five years. At first, my primary goal was to live the typical blissful life - chilling out with friends, playing sports like basketball and volleyball and games on the Playstation, and not worrying too much about schoolwork. However, the idea of being a typical, or average person has gradually become less appealing up to now. I have become more ambitious. In order to improve my grades and prepare for a bright future, I decided that instead of spending my time as extravagantly on video games and with friends, I must put those indulgences aside.
But when I first started to work hard, the change in course was nauseating. Because of my ambition to maintain top grades in school, I planned to dedicate at least four hours of study time at home per day, rather than the mere 1 hour I originally spent on homework on average. The problem I encountered was the difficulty of battling with the incessant desire to go on the computer and chat on MSN, or go to one of my friends’ birthday parties. The outlook of a complacent blissful life had not yet been completely erased from my mind. I sometimes succumbed to my desires and did hang out with my friends, but felt guilty of it later on.
It took years to completely put my indulgences to an end. I was unable to do this immediately; instead, I gradually developed an aversion from these leisurely activities due to the guilt that pricked at my side and built up from every instance of fun. The fun, exhilarating days of parties, friends, sports and games vanished from conception. Instead they were all replaced with practices pertaining to school, my plans for university, and ultimately my future prosperity. Yet a small corner of my mind longed for the day that I can hang out with my friends again, play the online computer game Starcraft on Battle.net again, and once again, have time to take up any hobbies that I ever found interesting.
So now, I am living a life in complete devotion to schoolwork, with any other activities being few and far between. My life feels dull at the moment, doing the same grind over and over again, but I just try to keep in mind that it is for the greater good. There is no other way for me to fulfill my goals than to give things up.</p>