The Drive to Success

Aidan Stetzer

Delaware State University

Survey of Liberal Studies

Dr. Ryane Cheatham

2/3/2023
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The identity I have formed for myself over the years has changed drastically since

college. Before college, I feel that I didn’t have a true identity that was mine. I always looked up

to people and tried to form into who they were, but never just used them as role models to make

myself who I wanted to be. I am from a small town in Pennsylvania, called Hamburg. The only

thing it is known for is having a large Cabela’s. I grew up surrounded by fields, farmers, and the

same group of kids I have known my whole life introduced to them by my parents. I never

planned to go to college or further my education in any way beyond high school. I left my public

high school in the 9th grade to move to an online cyber school to allow me more time to focus on

my riding showing Quarter Horses in either the reining or cutting disciplines. February of my

senior year of college my dad told me I had the opportunity to show horses for a D1 sports team

in college. As expected, I didn’t want to go. I loved the idea of showing horses in college but did

not want to do the learning and education part. After talking to the coach I agreed to my dad that

I would give it a year and if I didn’t like it after a year I could leave. I came to Delaware State

University in the fall of 2019, with the intensions of fulfilling an agriculture degree as

agricultural was all I ever knew. After giving it a year, I fell in love with the Equestrian Team at

Delaware State University and made friendships I hope last me a lifetime.

After a year I realized I am capable of doing more than just agriculture my whole life. I

love agriculture and I wanted to continue, but it wasn’t a field that was going allow me to live the

life I’ve been living. I need a job that will support my hobby of showing horses, having

livestock, paying bills, and allow me to take care of my nephew and give him the life my parents

gave me and his father. I decided I wanted to do better for him. My dream of always loping

horses at a horse show and becoming someone’s assistant trainer and one day becoming a head

trainer was out the window, because it would never pay the bills and allow me and someone else
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to live comfortably. At that time I decided to change my major and go into nursing, I’ve always

had an interest in nursing and always have enjoyed caring for people , but it was what my sister

did. So I never wanted to go that route because I didn’t want to live in the shadow of my

overachieving sister. I had to get over that idea, and realize that just because we have may end up

with the same degree it wouldn’t have to be the same specialty and I would still be my own

person, and that degree was what it was going to take in order to be better for Zane my nephew,

because I am all he has and I need to set a good example for him.

I started my new degree at Delaware State and enjoyed every second of it. I got a job

working as a Person Care Assistant in an Intensive Care Unit in a hospital back home over the

summer and it gave me reassurance that I made the right decision about changing my major.

Until nurses at my job would tell me that I should stay working as I am, and not get the nursing

degree. It made me question my decision, and then when I got a phone call saying I needed to

change my major again or kiss my spot on the Equestrian Team goodbye due to eligibility, I

made the switch to Liberal Studies with a concentration in Biology because of all the classes I

had already taken for both agriculture and nursing. I couldn’t give up my passion and the only

reason I came to college.

Before coming to Delaware State University, I would spend my summer in Virginia

riding cutting horses with people who I would call family even though they aren’t blood related.

It’s the same thing my dad did when he was my age. He went away and trained and rode horses

for quite awhile before he came to the same realization it wasn’t going to pay the bills and give

someone a life one day. I learned a lot while I was there and not just about training horses. They

were an old school southern family. I learned a lot about respect, manners, hard-work, and self-

accountability. All things I pride myself in today. Grady was a man everyone respected and
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looked up to because of his knowledge, personality, and the way he presented himself. I

personally looked up to him and his wife Judy who was a southern lady who spoke her mind, but

was also respectful and was a model of society. She helped me find confidence in myself, how to

be mentally tough, and to work hard even if it gets hard. All these things helped me on my

journey of coming to college and joining the Equestrian Team, because it is all the thing my

coach wants to see in an athlete. She takes pride in creating a strong family unit, hard work,

empowering women, and creating everlasting friendships.

I lost my way for a while on the Equestrian Team, I never played on a sports team. I was

a band geek in high school who rode horses. All the self-confidence I had built over the years at

Grady’s was gone. Until we got a new coach on the team, Rhonda was from the same era Grady,

Judy, and my father were from so I was able to understand her and find myself again and when I

did I was unstoppable in the arena and in my studies. She understood my style and upbringing so

I was able to grow as a women and a horseman on this team. I got the nickname “Monty” after

my dad, and that little thing is what it took for me to be able to ride anything, and do my part of

this team. Something as simple as a nickname can give you the confidence, edge, and grit to do

anything. My junior year we lost Rhonda as a coach, and were unsure if we were going to be

able to find another Western Coach. Coming back in the fall of my senior year there was a new

coach, and in preseason I struggled like no other. Everything she was saying went against the

foundation I had always been taught and it just tore me apart, because I wanted to respect her and

do everything she asked, but at the same time I didn’t want to go against everything I had always

been taught my entire life. I didn’t want to let a the struggle of understanding a new coach and

coaching style ruin my senior year. My teammates knew I was struggling and the first day I went

into pen for my senior year they all screamed “Let’s see it Monty” and it what was I needed to
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kick myself back into gear, of who I was, and what legacy I was going to leave behind. I’m

currently having the best season yet. Despite the uncertainty of what I’m going to do post-

graduation. I’m going to be leaving college with a degree I didn’t know existed, with the

uncertainty of what I’m going to do for a career, and who I am without the team.

When I talk to people in my life about my uncertainty, I’m always told oh I’m still young

I have time, but then I see people in their 30’s still struggling with that uncertainty. I don’t want

to be that person. After watching a video called “Why 30 is not the new 20” by Meg Jay. It

makes sense because those people I see still struggling were told the same thing I’ve been told

that they’re young and have time and that is not the case. I need to make decisions about my life

and take those steps to make my life my own even if it’s hard. I need to be taking those steps

now so that when I’m in my 30’s I have what I want. I will have that job I wanted, the house I

wanted, and the family I’ve always wanted. There was a quote that my old coach Rhonda used

to say, and it was “There is no elevator to success, You have to take the stairs.” We never knew

who said it but that is what has been pushing me to find out what I’m going to do after college. I

need to make the hard choice of will I pursue that nursing career after all, do I want to do

phlebotomy instead? Do I make the low pay work and go ride and show horses the rest of my

life? Right now I am in one of Erik Erickson’s 8 stages of psychological development called

Identity vs. Role Confusion. I am trying to discover who the adult Aidan is and whether I will

stick to my beliefs and upraising and go a different route. I am right in the middle of two of

Daniel Levinson’s stages of life that from the ages of 17-22 you are in your early adult transition

where you leave everything you know and start your education and start to make choices about

your career, and then from 22-28 you are in the entering the adult world where you are finding a

relationship, securing a career, and making your goals come true. I am struggling with both of
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those transitions into life right now. I will be 22 years old before I graduate in May, and I am still

left with so much uncertainty, and doubt. I don’t want to let down everyone that has worked so

hard for me to achieve these feats in life, but at the same time I don’t want to let myself down

settling on something.
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References

Course hero. Lifespan Development | | Course Hero. (n.d.). Retrieved February 3, 2023, from
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wmopen-lifespandevelopment/chapter/theories-of-
adult-psychosocial-development/

TEDtalksDirector. (2013, May 13). Why 30 is not the new 20 | Meg Jay. YouTube. Retrieved
February 3, 2023, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhhgI4tSMwc&t=1s