“As long as you are playing on my field, you will run on and off or you will sit the bench!” bellowed my tournament baseball coach during one particular mid-July practice when our team seemed like an awfully lethargic group of preadolescents. Given the conditions of that sweltering Saturday afternoon, I thought that it would be rather reasonable for our coach to give us a break and allow us to move at a slower pace, especially since the sun had sapped us of most of our energy. However, he did just the opposite. He expected us to mentally and physically push past the heat and work even harder. Being my 12-year-old self, I wanted no part of practicing in that heat, but, in retrospect, I needed to be out there. Although I didn’t realize it in the heat of the moment, I had just learned an invaluable lesson. If I am going to do something, I should do it to the best of my ability because, similar to the lesson I learned, time is invaluable. Once it is gone, you can’t get it back.

I have applied this belief throughout my life, in school, in the gym, and on the baseball field. It’s especially prevalent during this time of year as AP exams loom near. Although everyone enrolled in an AP class at my school is required to take the exam at the end of the year, not everyone studies for it. To me, that approach is a waste. Since I have had to sit through a class all year that is supposed to prepare me for the exam, why would I throw out all of those hours of studying for tests and chiseling away at the stack of homework that awaited me week after week? To me, it makes absolutely no sense. There will be those who say that they don’t want to put in the extra couple of hours to study, but a couple of hours is merely a drop in the bucket that my classmates and I have been filling all year. Now that I am just on the cusp of filling that bucket and completing high school for good, why would I stop a few drops short? Failing to finish out this last month or so strong would leave me feeling as if I left my business here in high school unfinished.

Every day, I hear about people dying in car accidents on the news or family friends passing away at the merciless hands of cancer. This serves as a constant reminder to me that any day could be my last. We are left, any one of us, with a finite number of hours left to live, so why would I waste them doing something with half effort? That’s why I believe in always living life with 100 percent effort. Time is the most valuable commodity and isn’t to be wasted.