I’ve actually discovered quite a few things this month, thanks to a poet and a poetic YouTuber, but I’ve decided to share the one that resonates with me the most.

You start dying slowly when you don’t appreciate yourself. One of the many beautiful lines in a poem by Pablo Neruda. I definitely wanted to appreciate myself but I was having trouble for two reasons. One, what was there to appreciate, I hadn’t done anything noteworthy or impressive. I’m just a college student getting average grades. And two, I didn’t really know what the definition was. It was can’t define the word without using the word kind of situation. Being the obsessive English major that I am, I looked it up.

I discovered that to appreciate something is to recognize the full value of it, to respect it, to understand it fully. It’s hard for me to not feel like nothing. Often I feel like I belong nowhere and accomplished nothing. But I think I discovered how this month. I’ll recognize my accomplishments, and understand that I’m only 19 and am already working on a screenplay (secretly but still). If I can learn to appreciate myself, then maybe I can start to working toward being someone that makes me happy.

By Ariel Y., 19, Highland Heights, KY