Committed to LMU: What College Applications Taught Me About Storytelling
After months of applications, essays, interviews, decisions, and campus research, I have officially committed to Loyola Marymount University!
This fall, I will be moving to Los Angeles to major in Health and Human Sciences as I continue preparing for a future in medicine. I am excited to experience a new city, meet new people, and begin the next chapter of my education.
Seventeen Acceptances and Seventy-Six Essays
By the end of the admissions process, I had been accepted to 17 colleges. Getting those decisions was exciting, especially after remembering how much time and effort went into every application.
In total, I wrote 76 essays.
Some were only a few hundred words, while others required much deeper reflection. I wrote about why I wanted to study medicine, how I had contributed to my community, challenges I had faced, experiences that had shaped me, and the kind of person I hoped to become.
At the beginning, 76 essays would have sounded impossible. However, I completed them one prompt at a time.
Learning the Art of Storytelling
The biggest lesson I learned from college applications was that an essay is not simply a place to repeat your résumé.
Your activities tell colleges what you did. Your essays show them how you think.
Writing required me to take my experiences, memories, and personality and put them onto paper. I had to think about why certain moments stayed with me and what they revealed about my values.
A clinical experience could become a story about empathy. A difficult school year could show perseverance. A leadership role could reveal how I handle responsibility. Even a small memory could become meaningful when I explained why it changed the way I saw something.
That is the art of storytelling. It is not about making your life sound perfect or dramatic. It is about helping another person understand how an experience affected you.
Discovering Who I Am
Senior year is often described as a time to celebrate and prepare for graduation, but it is also a time to reflect.
Throughout the application process, I learned more about who I am and what matters most to me. Medicine has remained a central goal, but I also recognized how strongly I value service, compassion, curiosity, leadership, and personal connection.
The essays forced me to slow down and look at the path that brought me here. Experiences that once seemed separate began to form one larger story.
Why LMU
Choosing a college was not easy, especially after receiving so many acceptances. Every school offered something different, but LMU felt like the right place for the next stage of my journey. I am also excited about living in Los Angeles and experiencing opportunities in a completely new environment.
Committing to LMU made everything feel real. Soon, I will be leaving the routines and people I have known for years and beginning again somewhere new.
The college application process was long and exhausting, but it taught me that our stories matter. The experiences themselves shape us, but reflecting on them helps us understand who we have become.
I am proud of the story that brought me here, and I cannot wait to begin writing the next chapter at LMU.