As someone who lived through 13 years of education, I'm proud to say that I'm one of the survivors of the American education system. The path of education is a battlefield for students, aiming to exercise and stretch their physical and mental capabilities to the maximum. Some may fall from drugs and bad environmental influences while others fall ill to the overnight stretches of workload, but what makes a battlefield or a learning environment worse is the immense mental pressure we get from family, friends, and ourselves. My mother always told me to "try my best," but I never knew what she meant by "best." As a student I always strive to be someone I'm proud of and achieve the most I could, aiming to be the best. However, other than making me more paranoid over the times I made mistakes, trying my best didn't help me in any other way.

Ever since elementary school, I've always tried my hardest, getting good grades and keeping up with my school work to the point I've isolated myself from the societal interaction. It wasn't until junior year did I become more involved with my community and become more social. That same year I begin to feel the anxiety of keeping up with the speed of school and organizing my life together. I had senior year even more rough as college applications, and tuition fees crept up on me as I bury myself for the end of year exams and AP testing. More than often I find myself lost and confused on how to bump my grades up while readying for exams and completing college applications while being on the lookout for scholarships to cover my tuition fee.

What ended up happening were my grades dropping to an all-time low, isolating myself from being social, and procrastinating on everything until I do everything in one day. It was a nightmare for the other students and me because for the first time we didn't know what to do and everything that I did went wrong and failed miserably. Days passed as I grew depressed and upset with myself, the feeling of loss and fear of moving forward shadowing me; I was so far away from "trying my best," so far from trying because everything I did try, I end up falling and being more upset at myself.

I became paralyzed and lazy, isolating myself from the world and just staying home just to think since it's practically impossible to fail at thinking. I sat in parks for hours just to think about what I should do, what could've been done, what I'm doing, and how I'm going forward from here on. What I realize from spending hours of thinking is that it's completely fine to be scared and lost, that it's only natural for us to be lost.

From elementary school to high school, we always followed a path the education system laid for us. When high school ends and college comes around, we transition to become adults and were required to make major decisions, a pressure that we never anticipated for. As students we did what we were best at and just procrastinated, just like any projects we did in school, leading to clashes in school, college, social life, and everything else. We were afraid that with every step we moved forward we would make ten more mistakes.

But in the end, it's fine to procrastinate and be lost as it's part of a transition to become a new person, a new you. Change is terrifying because we don't know where we're going or what's gonna happen once we get there, but in the end, everything plays out just fine as we grow accustomed to the new you and me. Being lost isn't a bad thing, not trying to get out of being lost is bad because that implies that you've given up your fight like surrendering in the middle of a battlefield. The phrase "try your best" places the emphasis on "try" and not "best;" we don't need to be the best, we just need to try.