How I Stopped Overthinking, and How it Helped Me Conquer my Writing by Diego

How I Stopped Overthinking, and How it Helped Me Conquer my Writing by Diego - July 2026 Scholarship Essay

I have never been the strongest writer in my class and, as far as I can remember, I never preferred English class over anything else. I remember how much I disliked my first high school level English course. I was in 8th grade, so I did not understand the rigor of a high school course and how much it would demand from me. I never had to face such difficulty in school before and remember how uncomfortable I felt every time I walked into class; I was uncomfortable because I did not know what it felt like to struggle in school. Keeping up with the workload was incredibly difficult and it made me doubt myself. It was a new experience for me and makes me appreciate how much I have improved since then. I finished English I with a bitter taste in my mouth, but it was in my English II class during my freshman year when I started to appreciate the importance of reading and writing in my life.

The first day I walked into my English II class, there was already an expectation of me that caught me off guard. My teacher, Mr. D, recognized my last name and confronted me in front of the class. I was confused at first, but it only took a few seconds for me to realize that he was talking about my brother. When I realized this, I knew what he was going to say, and it was not going to be good. My brother did not care to do well in school, so there was an expectation from Mr. D. that I was going to be similar, and I knew from that day that I would have to prove myself. The confrontation made me realize that I had to be better than I was before. If I didn’t improve, then I would let Mr. D. and myself down. I would spend many of my lunches in his room for help on how to improve my writing and occasionally reached out to family members for help if I did not have enough time during school. I struggled with longer essays and believed it was only my writing holding me back, but that was not entirely true.

During that year, I had to write a character analysis for Guy Montag from Fahrenheit 451. I was having a hard time writing the first words on the paper because I did not know where to start. I asked my mom for help, and she plotted a simple thought bubble diagram to visualize my thoughts. It seemed simple, but it made me realize that I overthink when I write and that my greatest barrier is knowing how to start; I was too scared to start with a draft because I wanted everything to be perfect before I moved on. Even though my writing did not improve immediately, it became easier to put my thoughts on paper and stop overthinking what I would write. This led to me writing more and my writing improved over time as a result of not overthinking. I am still not perfect and hesitate to start writing sometimes, but I have noticed significant progress since I entered high school. Learning how to draft has helped me not only in my writing, but in other areas of my life, especially in my passion for robotics and engineering. I find it much easier to start projects and have less fear of failure compared to when I first entered high school.