Annabel Monaghan is right—many colleges share a similar piece of advice that most teenagers have great difficulty following—write a college essay that will “capture your true and authentic voice and reveal the essence of who you really are.”
So let me put that advice a little differently—write a college essay that will help the admissions officers get to know more about you in a way that they couldn’t from your application alone.
Working at McDonalds, making dinner for her single dad, standing up on a surfboard for the first time, losing multiple elections, playing guitar in a garage band, hanging out amid the chaos in the kitchen of a Greek family with five kids—these are all real essays I’ve read, and they all captured their true and authentic voices and revealed some essence of who those kids really were.
And the best part? None of those kids asked themselves, “What story can I tell that will reveal the true essence of who I really am?” Instead, they just thought about their lives and shared something that mattered to them, and did so in their own words, without regard to whether or not it would appear impressive enough. Without the pressure to write something so innately profound, they actually did capture the essence of who they were. They were profound without trying to be.
No seventeen-year-old can be perfectly encapsulated in 500 words, and no college expects you to do so. So instead, use your essay to give the admissions officer some insight into you, your life, what you enjoy, where you struggle, etc. What would you have a lot to say about if someone asked you to share it? Start there.
If you write about something that matters to you, if you stop worrying about what will sound impressive and just write something that sounds like you, you’ll capture your true essence. And you’ll probably be profound without actually trying to be.