The college of my dreams looked upon me intimately as an enormous eagle would to a microscopic worm. The sun was predominantly covered by massive clouds from which water would pour down intensely. The trees were moving from side to side violently. The college was painted dull grey and looked haunted with ghosts and angry spirits. There was a fountain spurting water with great strength, and next to it were steps made of mesmerizing marble. This was Emory University, and I had to perform that night in front of a million strangers who were celebrating Korean Culture and knew very well what taekwondo should look like. I felt like there were tiny butterflies inside my stomach, fluttering around wildly to be set free. The nervousness only increased as I entered the huge and frightening college. Little did I know that my first nerve-wrecking taekwondo performance would soon transform me into a person that is confident, fearless, and social.

Day and night, our demo instructors worked hard on the making of the performance from scratch. When it was finally created, all of our members practiced and memorized the entire demonstration thoroughly. As I practiced each and every single kick and punch with sweat dripping from my forehead, I made sure I had the correct distance from others and that I used all of the power that my exhausted body contained. Still walking through the school, I thought of the uselessness of the hours of intense practice and effort if something would mess up. Not only would that be wasted, but my chances of having a high position and respect from others in the team would be crushed into little pieces of glass. In the inside, I knew that this performance was important for multiple reasons, but the anxious feeling covered the importance and left me shaking. I wanted to run back home and hide myself under a soft blanket so that I would not experience the painful emotions flowing through my body. Our ten-person group walked silently into the auditorium as another performance was going on and entered the backstage area.

The backstage was rusty and full of dust. It looked as if it had not been cleaned for years, maybe even decades. I could see the stage through a crack in the cracked wall. There was an extremely bright light illuminating the entire stage. The wood on the floor looked slick, just like the skin of a frog that just came out of the water from a swim. The stage appeared to be recently built because it was clean and luminous unlike the rusty area I was currently in. The curtains in front were thick, soft, and made of purple velvet. There were beautifully dressed Korean ladies with traditional fans practicing their dance routine next to me in the backstage area. They had all of the colors you could imagine on their swirly dresses. The colors reminded me of the rainbow on my favorite night lamp as a child. I went into a deep thought about my childhood and transitioned to the past for a moment. I remembered the time I went to India and was scared of the rude men and beggars on the street, the time a spider hung at the top of my face, and the time I thought I had a monster under my bed, so I cuddled against my mother’s chest and slept with her. I was always frightened of every single object and was not brave enough to do the simplest tasks. All of a sudden, a tall, young man with the voice of Master Jung hovered over me and said deeply, “Let’s go Shanin. Time to perform.” Our group did the team cheer to encourage ourselves and entered onto the stage that challenged me.

I walked up to the stage with my heart pounding fiercely against my chest and the palms of my hands sweating like I just ran a mile without stopping to take a break. I heard the beats of my heart increase in speed and endured a terrible burning sensation on my hands. Lights shined brilliantly all around me, and I felt as if I was the center of attention. The audience had tons of people sitting silently in their seats, waiting for their entertainment to begin and my suffering to start. The amount of people altogether made me feel nauseous. The music for our meditation part burst through the speakers and every single person was still and quiet. I kneeled down onto to cold and hard floor and started the dramatic entry we were supposed to do. Then, I began to do the kicks and blocks that I learned through weeks of practice. I sensed that I was making mistakes on all of the movements I was doing. I became lightheaded and thought that every kick, punch, and block belonged to a different Shanin. The Shanin who was weak, afraid, and behaved like a baby girl crying for her mother. However, all of that was just me overthinking in frustration. In reality, I was doing perfectly fine. I realized that nervousness was a great disadvantage to being successful and that it was the problem of the time. 

I desperately glanced toward the audience in search of the one authority that made every endeavor in my life possible. There was my mother, sitting directly across from me in the front row with a nice grin on her face and her thumbs up in the air. My heart beat reached a normal pace, and my body became powerful with an abundance of energy. I was reminded of the few minutes in the car before arriving at the college. My mother gave me some inspirational advice as always. She said, “There is no need to be nervous because there will be a countless number of worse situations that you will have to face later on in life. You have to be brave.” All of her rejuvenating advice went into my mind and remained there. Thinking of her advice changed me completely at that moment. I became confident, and with every kick and punch I gave my best. I proved to the world that I was capable of confronting any obstacle. The rest of the performance went by smoothly, and I did a great job on my special board breaking technique- power tornado kick. All of the boards flew toward the audience, and they yelled at the top of their lungs with amazement. 

The crowd applauded for our entire group, and we all bowed as a sign of thanking the audience for their presence. The cheering of people made me become aware of who I truly was and what I was capable of. I knew that this achievement would bring new experiences into the close future. I thought that I would feel part of every activity rather then left off. I also knew that I would think positively instead of negative. The emotions completely reversed from the beginning to the end of the demonstration. I stood next to the significant fountain of water at the entrance to take a picture of my new beginning. I was proud of who I was and promised myself that I would forget about nervousness and try my best at all times. This would make me a better person and would make life easier to handle. Before experiencing my first demonstration, I was always petrified. I used to be scared of every action around me and depend on adults to solve problems for me. I was also very shy and did not get along well with others. After all, I never stared conversations with people. I would just sit there, quiet like a cat licking his paws. Just one performance made me believe in myself more, and I started to socialize with others and show them who I really was. I did not have too much confidence. There was a limitation to it. “Over- confidence is your enemy, but confidence is your friend.” That is what my mother said a few days after she saw me change. Over time, I worked on learning to accomplish dangerous activities like sleeping with the lights off, watching horror movies, and swimming at the deep end of the pool. In the present, I am the bold Shanin who takes risks, but is still careful.

It is extremely important to understand the lesson learned from this rough yet life-giving experience. Anxiety and being nervous just makes situations worse because people expect to see failure; it is always better to do one’s best instead and be proud. Confidence is the key to success. However, misusing confidence will make life miserable all over again. Overall, this lesson has brought me somewhere in life. This is what led me to becoming a summer teacher at taekwondo and a 3rd degree black belt. Also, it helped me with presentation skills in school. Without experiencing the stress of that first demonstration, I would have still been a little girl in my mother’s arms.