Tell Us The Truth What are you really supposed to tell us in your college essay? About that perfect cup of bitter coffee you made your mom, every morning, so she could have the energy to go to her job at the factory? Certainly not the obvious? Those everyday truths you live by and with? How you whisper a wish to each spoonful of sugar you put in her second, evening coffee, a wish that her life could get just a tad sweeter, and you can get just a little more sleep? Actually, yes, exactly that. Did you think the obvious was just too obvious? Sometimes the obvious is amazing. But no one puts it into words. "It takes all kinds to make a world," an old, old farmer once told me (yes, I know farmers). This after we watched a woman climb out of a Jaguar convertible at his vegetable stand, and then haggle him down from the 50 cents he was asking for his cucumbers. It's imperfect, she insisted, her perfect red-red lips somehow never coming unpursed. That's what happens when food is organic, he told her gently, shrugging. She offered a quarter. He took it. It takes all kinds to make a world. Duh? The Obvious has resonance. When you (finally) put it into words, everyone feels ownership over that observation. Like it's theirs. The obvious is said in a particular voice (yours) from a particular vantage point (yours). But it carries universal resonance (ours). Another example: My petite 11-month old son is just learning to cruise on this atrocious orange walker we found on our block. Yesterday, a man large in frame and big in bone passed him, looked down fondly and noted: They are little when they are little! The baby probably measured halfway up this neighbor's shin, and that's with bed hair, and was about the size of the man's calf. But here the baby is, all 17 pounds of him, steamrolling down the sidewalk, eye to eye with puppy dogs. They are little when they are little. Well, duh? And then there is the comedian's prerogative: Or Continue Reading …
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Show and Tell in your college essay
A throwback to the first time: Show and Tell Little kids will bring anything to Show and Tell at school. The grimiest blanket. A rock from the park. A one-legged Barbie. A scratched up draft of your college essay. They hold it out with awe. It's theirs, and now everyone is looking at it. "Show and Tell!" the teacher cues. A very early lesson in attention and narrative technique. The kid launches into an explanation of why this blanket, this rock, this draft-- is awesome. Worthy of a classroom's set of eyes. Just bringing the chosen object to that circle makes it special. The trick: the audience sees the object, experiences it with the Young Narrator. Your college essay is not that different. You can pick the grimiest, most common, most scratched up topic-- and you can make it special by how you handle it. But we-- your readers-- have to see what's going on. You need to SHOW us. There are a few principles to follow, because like everything, it's not THAT simple. Prepare yourself to write. First, have fuel, your apple juice and cookies. Actually, we recommend water with lemon and some protein. And, if we're being honest, maybe some caffeine. Then, sit in a chair too small for your butt, so you won't want to stay too long and so the world feels big and possible. (Skip this step if you don't like feeling ridiculous). Take out your writing instruments. Conjure the awe and importance kids feel when they hold out that rock, Show and Tell. SHOW first, then Tell. Bring your reader to a moment in your life when something small (be small on purpose) made a big difference. Was it the team sweatshirt you picked to wear that fateful day? Was it that unnecessarily snide parting comment you made to mom? Was it a call you missed, a text you sent? Was it the kind of pen you had? Was it the last popsicle you ate? Write a scene in which we see the object and the role it played in events. Then, TELL us what the significance Continue Reading …
Be Bold in Your College Essay
A bold kid on a mission to write When I was in fourth grade, I was obsessed with opera. And I had a bold teacher, Mr. F, who was lanky and fierce in creativity and temper. He always smelled like coffee. Luckily, he also was obsessed with opera-- some of the same ones. And, like me, he liked to write. Mr. F, however, was a musician who had actually written and produced an opera. About the revolutionary war. For fourth graders to perform. In a public elementary school. I was 9. I told Mr. F I wanted to write an opera. And what did he say? Go for it; I'll help you. This encouragement is what each of us needs to be equally bold. Someone saying, Got dreams? Got something to say? Go for it; I'll help you. What did I know then about ambition? I wore paisley print stretch pants, velour shirts, and Velcro sneakers, to give you an idea. I was still eating pita-and-peanut-butter-and-honey for lunch every day, and throwing my invariably mealy apple in the over-sized cafeteria trash can (and why was it over-sized? Guess!). But even with no feel yet for literary structure, never having written lyrics, I still thought I could write an opera. And I started right away on my dad's long yellow legal pads. What I wrote strangely resembled my favorite opera in character, in plot and....I had no idea how one would compose song. Do you get it? I could do none of the things required to actually write an opera, but I still THOUGHT I COULD DO IT. As soon as I was supported, I got started. I was bold. Self-doubt was not even in my vocabulary. I think the opera is somewhere in my parent's basement now. I don't need to see it because I'm embarrassingly confident how bad it is. But I'm so proud of that kid. In your college essay, be like a ballsy fourth grader.. Here's the deal: your work is only as bold as you're willing to be. And sometimes we need a hand at our back, a voice in our ear saying, Go For It. Sometimes we need to switch our seat at the Continue Reading …
My college essay got me what?
My college essay got me in....to this It's 8AM on a Wednesday. I am 19 years old, drinking my 14th cup of weak college cafeteria coffee, staring at an ancient Greek verb. Eistha. I'm supposed to know something about this. I have clocked in exactly three hours of sleep. I know about as much as you do, reading this, right now. The verb stares back at me, equally uninformed. My life looked like this chart. My professor, Alan Boegehold (who died this week, 17 years later) is looking out at the two of us expectantly-- because, you got that right, there are only two of us in that class--, a map of Sparta under his thumb. The map is fuzzed at the edges, to appear antique. This is the battle that would change everything. If that everything means anything to you, now, thousands of years out. (But for you battle nerds, this.) Boegehold is recapping for us where all the warships are, waiting to attack a certain strait. He's so into the heated stakes, a scholar's video game. At this moment, the minor things matter the most-- is the verb in the future? Is the ship pointed a hair to the right? I'm wishing I had bought a Starbucks.The kind as black as night should be if you don't live in Brooklyn and if there is no moon. My college essay is to blame To get here-- this school, this class, this major-- I wrote a very very very (apparently) convincing personal essay for my college application essay-- BY HAND. That's right, by hand. In hand-writing. It was about a junior-year school trip to Spain, where I stayed with a family in Barcelona. On the first day there, I confused two nouns-- mariscos (seafood) and maridos (spouses, husbands)-- and so informed my host mother that I don't eat a lot of things, but I do eat maridos. Meaning, husbands. Instead of mariscos, meaning seafood. The car went silent. I have no idea how I concluded the essay, what lesson or trait my personal essay took pains to show. Maybe the importance of detail, the weight of a Continue Reading …
Your college essay and more in 10 minutes
Is this yet another "improve my life in 10-minutes" BS pitch? No. We don't play with your minutes here. But we want you to get the most out of your time. So-- do you have 10 minutes to spare? (If you're reading this, you probably have 10 minutes. Admit it. Stop checking your Facebook Feed.) (Everyone has 10 minutes.) But the problem is: what's the most important thing to do-- right now? How should you spend those precious minutes? Here's our recommendations. Determine what you need, first. Need to open up and calm down? Check out this guided meditation from Tara Brach. (It's 10 minutes-ish. Thanks for your generous meditations, Tara Brach!) Need to work out on the sly? Check out this "Quiet Workout." (It's 10 minutes-ish. Modify as needed. Thanks for these original quickies, pop sugar!) Need to say something about something? We recommend-- assess your energy level, consider options 1 and 2 above, hydrate, and then... Freewrite Get your writing instrument/implement of choice: Sit your butt down or stand your butt up. (Don't have a standing desk? DIY with a crate placed on top of a table, or by working on a kitchen counter). Set a timer for 10 minutes. (See? We're precise!) And write about what makes you mad. Without stopping. (Thank you, writing guru Don Murray). Or try this writing prompt, from Ted Ed: A genie grants you three tiny wishes. What are they? (Thank you, TED. You are so full of useful randomness. Want more prompts?) Help, I really don't have 10-minutes! The multi-taskers version. Even though multi-tasking has been proven as neurological BS (You're uni-tasking, in quick succession, and with crappy outcomes), sometimes we need to layer up. Especially if we really only have 10 minutes. In that case we suggest: Do the Tara Brach meditation while you are on the toilet or taking a shower. Do the workout while returning a phone call to someone who will understand if you are out of Continue Reading …
Begin your college essay anywhere
How to begin writing your college essay? Sometimes it feels harder than bench pressing 3x your weight. Sometimes it feels harder than plucking hairs with your non-dominant hand. Sometimes it feels harder than spelling French words correctly. But it doesn't have to. Faced with the challenge of how to begin, just begin. That is, go around the challenge by refusing to see it as a challenge. Overwrite the fear, inertia, or blank feeling by starting right there, using it as your prompt. Freewrite from this moment Caffeinate yourself until you see double, turn down the sound of babies crying and your neighbor's weird fetish for Frank Sinatra, turn down the sound of siblings having the same old fight, parents barking, friends texting....and start there. I mean, you could start with any of the things listed above, the particulars of your life. Or you could start with the emotion-- or lack of emotion-- that facing an essay brings up. For example, you might set a timer, take a few deep breaths and start: "At this moment, I am staring at the page, well aware that what I put on this page is supposed to be super talented, attractive, and make me sound as Good as Friday. To handle this amount of pressure and anxiety, I am on my third Starbucks Peppermint Latte, which I got with my last dollar for the week, and now I add to my list of crappy things that I might not be able to sleep for a month from the amount of stimulant coursing through my blood, and I notice all the other people working nearby-- I'm in the library-- and that they all seem to be typing freely and easily, so I have to believe they are updating their social media accounts, not writing an application essay. I just noticed that is the longest sentence ever..." Will you win the Pulitzer for this content? Likely not, but if you do, please mention that this blog helped you get going. That said, who cares? The way you get over not knowing where to begin is by Continue Reading …