<p>I wrote an essay and would be appreciate some critique. Thanks</p>
<pre><code>Few would say juggling is easy, and those that would tend to spice up the act with a few tricks. Expert jugglers cannot impress anyone, and are hardly deserving of their title, if they stick to juggling the ordinary three balls. Many of these aficionados enhance their performances with either more objects, more dangerous objects, or more blazing dangerous objects. It is a profession that requires unwavering attention, unfailing skill, and unending discipline. Juggling is not easy.
But some people refer to juggling as a condition of life. People balance work, school, family, recreation
and just as an expert juggler must keep everything aloft, we do so as well. A juggler may not slip up when performing his art: the slightest error can turn the whole act into disarray, and may well ruin the juggler. We must also be careful to balance priorities dutifully, or else our lives may topple around us. However, when either the act of juggling or the juggling of life is performed successfully the reward greatly outweighs the cost.
Unfortunately, though many have often thought to themselves to learn how to juggle, few attain the attention, skill, and discipline needed to do it well. They sleepwalk through life until old age and realize they have accomplished nothing. How thrilling it would be to tell the grandkids how one travelled to every continent, or made millions, or even flew to the moon. No, their lives will be lived out with the complacency that soured their youth. Every TV show watched with glazed eyes and hour idly wasted was an hour of time that could have been used for learning, teaching, exploring, helping
but for fear and laziness that drives us all to our worst.
Before high school, I was letting life pass me by. Rather than do schoolwork or anything productive I browsed the web and watched TV, ignorant of the innate potential I have as a human being. All that was needed to make a change was my decision, one that I made for the better. I realized at the end of the 8th grade that if I continued the way I that had been, I would be left behind by the passionate and driven of the world. My parents travelled to America for our family, and not taking advantage of the opportunities denied them in the Soviet Union would be ungrateful and foolish.
So I started 9th grade working hard and have been working hard to this day. Keeping up my grades and giving full effort to everything I did: whether it was homework, athletics, or a hobby. Despite my best efforts, junior year hit me like a bus: five AP classes, Cross Country, Track and Field, Running Club, and Robotics took up every hour of my days; I was stretched thin as paper. My only consolation amidst the stressing environment was that the final result would be worth it. But the end of every successful juggling act has an applause, and I received no small bravo when I received my semester grades, when I ran my personal record in the mile, and when my robotics team made the semi-finals in the Washington Cascade regional. The act had paid off.
I begin my senior year with no doubt that there will be challenges. I may be asked to juggle chairs, knives, and perhaps even burning tomahawks! What is juggled is not important. Nothing would inspire awe if it were easy to do, and nobody would embark on a difficult task if it were not worthwhile. Everyone has the choice to take up a challenge, whether small or large. It is the decision to break away from complacency and self satisfaction that leads to fulfillment, a reward greater than the applause from a juggling act. I am glad to have elected the path of the juggler.
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