I always did cheerleading throughout my childhood. My mom was a cheerleader and I always wanted to follow in her footsteps. I had done cheer camps ever since I was in kindergarten. When I finally made it on the cheerleading squad in high school, I could not have been happier.

I worked as hard as I could. I would go to practice and give it my all. From stunts to cheers, I would make it my priority to make my mom proud. When we did workouts after practice, I would push myself to my fullest potential so that I could put up my stunts. I would come home and have my mom help me with cheers, so I knew I would look flawless when I performed.

I knew I was going to be doing cheer all through high school and if I could cheer in college, then I would. All of those plans changed while practicing some stunts for a performance that my squad was going to have at a pep rally. It was going to be my first performance as a high school cheerleader and I was so excited.

When stunting, I was a base (the person that throws the girls up in the air). I was taught that you will never let your flier hit the ground. I always made sure to do just that. While practicing, my flier went up in the air, but she did not go straight up like she was supposed to. She went more to the side where no one was there to catch her. I hastened to catch her, accomplishing the task by myself. As she landed in my arms, my knee gave out and I blew it out completely.

At the moment, I thought it was the worst possible thing to happen in my life. However, looking back at it now, I realize it is the best thing that could have happened. I promised my flier that I would not let her hit the ground and I made sure to keep that promise. I will never change my decision to catch her, because being forced to start cheering helped me find my passion for music.

When I was down and upset about the accident, my band director was there for me. He helped me find my way to music and put my emotions into my music. I started focusing on music and found my love for it. From that day on, I knew I wanted to keep music in my life forever. It also pushed me into going into the career path that I am currently pursuing.

I knew that I wanted to help other students with anything going on in their life, like my band director did for me. I did not know how I was going to do that until I talked to him and he persuaded me to look into music education. I could not have picked a better career for myself.

Looking back now, I think blowing my knee out was the best thing that happened to me. I use to think it was the worst thing, but if it would not have happened, I probably would not be persuing the degree that I currently am. I also would not have wanted to keep music in my life like I do now.

When something bad happens to you, try not to always see it as a negative. If something bad has already happened in your life, look at all of the other doors that have opened up with it. Sometimes a bad situation can turn out to be something great. I love the life that I have now, even though it came from a seemingly bad situation. You can, too.