“Why fit in when you were born to stand out.” – Dr. Seuss
For so long I thought that I needed to fit in, I tried so hard to fit into the little box that I was given to me and never questioned it.
Until I finally discovered, hey I don’t need to do that, I know crazy talk.
As I have mentioned before I have grown up in a pretty unorthodox way, being home schooled, dancing a lot, graduating early, and moving all over the place. They all seem kind of weird separate but even weirder together.
My younger self was always attempting to fit in, get all A’s and be liked by everyone. Every time that we moved to a new place a different Mia would emerge. As I would do almost anything to fit in with the new crowd of people around me.
Around the sixth move, I decided you know what, I don’t need to fit in. It will be okay, the world won’t explode if I don’t. Through doing this, I’ve found some of my closest friends, people that I consider to be more family than friends. The reason being, when they met me, they met me.
Ballet
Since that move, I’ve just been going for it. I no longer felt pressure to be a certain way and love the freedom of being a genuine me. A few moves later and my family ends up in Kansas City. I was dancing more than I ever had before. The average week consisted of thirty-plus hours of training. I was drained both mentally and physically, burnout hit me hard really hard. I made the difficult decision to say goodbye to something that had been not only a part of my life but a part of my identity for so many years.
Praxis
Soon after I made the decision to quit, a new wave of uncertainty hit me. I am a goal and plan orientated person, I thrive in those settings. When I realized that I had nothing planned is when the panic started to set in. On a whim, I decided to apply for a business apprenticeship program called Praxis. I didn’t know much about it other than the little my mom told me about at the beginning of the spring semester. Out of sheer luck, I got in.
Conclusion
I am now starting that journey here, with this, and many more projects ahead of me. I’m thrilled to get started on a new adventure and push myself to do things that a year ago I would’ve been terrified of.
Being seventeen and in this position is a rather strange mix of both excitement and pure fear,. But I’m ready to tackle everything that life is about to throw at me.