Tayson Prete

English 20-1
January 18th, 2021
Who You Are: A Personal Story of Discovering Yourself through Independence and Self-
Reliance

I was a happy kid before this storm hit us, discovering who I was through performing

arts. I was a well-respected member of our band, choir, and drama, and had even been a member

of various bands outside of school. I had also just got into a phenomenal new friend group, the

fact of which still astounds me to this day. I still remember the day I knew my whole world was

about to crumble around me. It was the 13th of March of last year, the Gold Jazz Band had a short

intermission from our fanciest gig yet; a cabaret at the Sandman, one of the most prestigious

hotels in our city. Me and my newly acquired friends were leaning up against the railing of a

balcony, talking about rumours of this virus that had supposedly found its way to North America,

when I had received a notification on my phone. I checked it as any normal teen would and saw

that it was an email from the LDS church, of which I am a member. I get emails from them

regularly, but checked it anyways, and when I read the contents, I had to do a double take. It said

church meetings would be suspended until further notification. I relayed this info to my fellow

musicians, and one commented jokingly on what I knew to be true; if the church had to shut

down, it wouldn’t be long before my world followed, and I was correct. Two days later my

family was celebrating my younger brother’s birthday, when the news was flashing everywhere,

from the small screen of my phone, to the big screen of our television; Canada was going into a

lockdown, and who knew for how long. As much as the world was panicking, I just accepted that

mine was over, and stopped trying at anything. I didn’t know what I was going to do, until my
grandpa called me, and after learning about my struggles, he gave me a lecture on independence

and self-reliance. I look his words into account, then into practice as I tried to live his advice. I

soon learned that self-reliance doesn’t come overnight, so I worked hard, talking with various

wise relatives, each giving me sound advice on what to do. Just like any teen, I am not

completely independent or self-reliant, but the lessons I learned helped me see what I needed to

do then, as well as what to do once the future came. It was over a span of time of working on this

that I realized there was another benefit to becoming stronger on your own; I learned more about

who I was. I learned that as you focus on yourself, you discover more about you, such as

passions, emotions, even identity. Despite all the challenges I faced, I managed to overcome it

with a little help from others, and a lot of help from myself.

Fear is a thing that drives the strongest people to do rash things. There is no wonder that

once Covid began to spread, people began to panic. Once it hit North America, it was thrown

into a frenzy, as rumours of a future lack of essential items spread, forcing people to hoard as

much as they could. The greatest example of this is toilet paper. Videos can be found of people

swarming like ants to sugar and fighting as if their lives were at stake, simply in order to get even

a single pack of the stuff. Those were the fears of the time, nowadays people fear potential side

effects of this new vaccine coming out, saying that not enough is known about it to call it safe.

What scares me about this is the fact that the facts to disprove their worries are always available

online, but people refuse to look it up, and spread false rumors on social media, where teens and

adults alike can be quite susceptible, and cause even more widespread fear of the only thing that

can bring an end to this pandemic. I’ve been directly tied to this problem, all because of my

overprotective mother. As much as I love her, I detest her views on many things, a few more
than others. Her pessimistic views on people are one that is understandable in small doses, or as

long as it doesn’t affect me, but when I can’t hang out with certain friends all because she hasn’t

met their parents is not only ridiculous in my eyes, but the fact that her complete lack of faith in

humanity has started to affect the identity development of my siblings is not just worrying, but

utterly terrifying. But as frustrating as that is, there is one thing that I despise above all else. She

doesn’t want her kids to get the Covid vaccine because of reasons that have already been proven

false. This is an issue that I’ve always had with people who refuse to get their kids vaccinated.

There are valid reasons why someone shouldn’t get it, but when that reason is because they are

afraid of a potential side effect, yet refused to do the research on the topic, I can’t help but worry

about what that could mean for our future. And this shouldn’t be just one of my fears, but should

be for everyone, whether they get the vaccine or not. Even if you aren’t afraid of getting Covid

yourself, get it for those who can’t. People are being admitted to tents in parking lots because our

hospitals are overcrowded and dying because of it. If that’s not enough to scare everyone on this

planet, then I might lose faith in humanity too.

But this large-scale fear is not the only type out there, in fact, there might be one even

more worrying. Personal fears can be more potent on a psychological level, especially fears

associated with your social life rather than fears of spiders, sharks, or any other generic phobias.

A few weeks into the primary lockdown, I realized that I had a fear hidden from me until then; I

was afraid of being alone. Fortunately for me I am the oldest of six kids, so I was never truly

alone, but something triggered this realization, whether it be the fact that I had to motivate

myself to do schoolwork, or just being stuck in our basement for hours on end, I had learned that

I was afraid of loneliness. From that, this newfound phobia began to blossom in me like a black
rose, digging its thorns into my brain, forcing upon me new worries as I began to focus on my

worries over school. I had realized that I wouldn’t see any of my friends for a while, or in some

cases, ever again. This pattern repeated week after week, until about the end of April, when I

stopped doing schoolwork altogether. I had only heard stories of, and seen loved ones struggle

through depression, but never before then did I think I would know how they felt at their lowest,

yet there I was, forced to wallow in the very thing that dragged me down in the first place. Then

one day I got a call from my grandpa, asking me if I wanted a place to work over the summer,

because he needed help at his small bookstore in Cardston. I agreed to it and was ready just to

hang up, when my grandpa asked me how things were going. These sorts of questions are not

uncommon for him, yet I found myself struggling to answer, so I simply answered that I was

getting by, which in and of itself was a lie. He then followed up by asking how online school was

going. Despite wanting to answer here the same as the prior, I somehow found myself saying that

things weren’t going so well. Then my grandpa, being the kind of man he is, gave me a lecture. I

had heard many of his lessons before, but this one took a light that none other had as he gave me

advice I’d never forget. He taught me about independence and self-reliance, saying “Your

mother won’t always be there to tell you what to do. Sometimes, you need to take the initiative

and do things for yourself. If you don’t learn how to act on your own, you’ll never be able to get

through adulthood.” It took a week for his words to sink in, and I had to talk to a few other

family members about my issue, but once I did, I decided to take my grandpa’s advice and tried

to take the initiative. Had my beloved grandpa not called when he did, I might not have finished

school that year, despite our grades being frozen.

 After the application of the advice my relatives gave me, I swiftly learned that self-

reliance is not something that can come to fruition overnight. It took me months of hard work

and endless endurance in order to get a small sense of independence and self-reliance. After I

began to go back to school again, I had to work out a way with my teachers to catch up on my

missed assignments, which itself wasn’t hard, but completing the assignments, especially for

social studies and English, was a long and gruelling task. Even finishing a few assignments each

week, it took me a month and a half to catch back up, and that’s with a few hours every day

working on those assignments. But becoming self-reliant with school is much different from

being self-reliant with your other tasks is a whole new task on its own. As was forementioned, I

am deep into the performing arts, and thus am encouraged to train my various talents, but I had

given up on practice long before school went digital. I only broke out my instruments when I was

bored, only acted for comedic conversations, and only sang to impress others. So alongside

trying to get back to school, I told myself that I was going to practice my many talents regularly.

That day I picked up and played every instrument I knew how, watched a musical on YouTube,

and even learned a song from it on piano. The next day, I played most of my instruments and

sang a bit of my guitar, but that’s it. The day after that, I only played my guitar out of boredom,

and didn’t even sing. I went back to my regular routine, prioritizing school, only playing my

instruments when bored, only acting for comedic conversations, and only singing to myself in

the shower, because I couldn’t go anywhere to impress anyone with my voice. I thought I was

doing alright as far as independence went, until about a week later until my mom told me to

practice my instruments. She continuously does so, thus I thought nothing of it, until about an

hour later, when my brain had just processed what had happened. My grandpa’s lesson flashed

back into my mind, his reminder that my mom won’t always be there to tell me to do things. I
had forgotten about that aspect of independence, and out of spite for myself more than anything,

I went and practiced all I could. I still struggle with practicing all I can today, but I did learn one

important lesson. Independence and self-reliance are not one-and-done things, it takes

continuous endurance in order to develop and maintain those qualities, and that is not an easy

process.

As difficult as gaining and maintaining independence and self-reliance is, the arduous

journey is well worth the labor. As was forementioned, I had issues with needing to be reminded

to do things constantly, whether it be from my mother, or from my past self through my phone.

Regardless, when I got to the point when I was at least self-reliant enough to get my school life

back on track, I started to see that if I did things myself, I could get a lot more done. The only

application of this principle I used was in school, but it didn’t take long until I started to bring

this knowledge to my personal life. I found myself spending less time on the couch, and more

time upright, doing the things that I had previously said I would, such as tidying up my desk so I

can actually see its surface, learn how to play that guitar that I got for Christmas three years ago,

or just see where I can be helpful around the house. While on this quest for independence, I

couldn’t help but send my mind into the future, my grandpa’s words ringing through my head,

“Your mother our mother won’t always be there...” With being LDS, I plan to serve a mission

shortly after school, and that is one of the greatest trials of independence in my near future.

Spending two years in a foreign land without any of my family members helping me through it

didn’t sound very pleasing to the me from last year, but now it’s seeming like the right move.

After that, however, there’s still much more that will require immense amounts of self-reliance,

such as selecting a career path, choosing a post-secondary program and following through with
my studies, finding my own place and taking care of myself, and eventually finding the woman

of my dreams, and asking her hand in marriage. These acts would be altogether impossible if I

needed someone to tell me to do them every step of the way, so it is vital that we learn

independence and self-reliance before it’s too late. Even though these tasks will seem

intimidating to a seventeen-year-old like me, but by preparing as I have, I find myself not as

daunted by the prospect of the future.

Despite all these benefits I gained in my quest for self-reliance, there is one thing I found

that outweighs all treasures. I learned that as you focus on yourself, you learn volumes about

who you are. I discovered things about myself that I would have missed otherwise. For some,

this could be political views, religious enlightenment, or even what career you wish to pursue. I

discovered a bit of each of these, but I also discovered a few new passions. Before everything

started, I knew that I loved writing and speaking, but it was only after reading my own works to

people did I realize that I had a passion for storytelling. After trying a few different mediums for

this, I fell back on something I had experimented with a few years ago. Back in eighth grade, I

was invited to play the timeless classic roleplaying game Dungeons and Dragons with some

older relatives. I had never done anything quite like it, but as much as I admired playing as a

character, I wondered what it would be like running a game of my own. Once summer came

around and online school was finally over, I reached out to the same relatives and asked if they

wanted to play again, but this time with me at the head. Most agreed, only turning down due to

prior engagements, and so we played over the course of the summer. Spells were cast and dice

were rolled, right up until the thrilling conclusion. After the game, I asked for some reviews of

how it went, especially from a player perspective. The comments I got about how well I ran it
and how exciting and beguiling my tale was, brought me a type of joy I had never experienced

before, and it was then that I knew this was how I would express my fables. Since then, I’ve run

a few other adventures with a few other groups, the joy of my players acting as the fuel to keep

me going. Once school started hitting hard again, I was forced to slow the frequency, or even

temporarily suspend my games in order to keep up with my work. Despite this, as I learned from

my adventures in self-reliance, I kept writing fables for when I can start running them again, for

to stop trying is to give up completely. It was during one of my evenings writing in my

basement, on my cheap little laptop, during the most recent lockdown, that I had a moment of

clairvoyance. It was then I knew, no matter the fears in the world or doubts in your heart, no

matter the challenges you are facing, independence and self-reliance is something that needs to

be practiced, because as you focus on yourself, you might discover new way to bring you joy,

because in a world of trials, nothing is more important than yourself.