Dear Jacob, it’s been a long ride since the beginning of college last year for many reasons,

some

of which won't be discussed in this paper. Looking back however, I wonder how I let some

things get so bad. I wasted a lot of money and let a lot of people down which is something no

one ever wants to do. For a while now I have always known my strengths and weaknesses, but

my strengths have always outweighed my weaknesses. I have always been able to succeed. By

the end of my senior year I had finished top ten in my class and became male athlete of the year,

but last year I let go of my goals, my future, my mentality, and even some of my personality

which was probably my strongest trait. Now however things will be different, I know what I

have to do and I will do it no if ands or but’s. You see, since my struggles last year with family,

friends, and people very close to me I have learned a lot and grown up very quickly these past

few months. I have changed a lot I would say maybe in some bad ways, but also in a lot of good

ways. Now I am strong and finally realized that hard work will always pay off. Which is

definitely my biggest strength, which is being a workaholic. I love to be busy and I love that

feeling of accomplishment after the work is done whether that is in school, my job, or the gym.

Also one of my biggest strengths now is my mentality, I am very goal oriented and my goals are

what drive me in the right direction and give me the strength to keep pushing myself to be the

best I can be. I have this plan or even a motto that I live by that basically says you know that's

better than going to the beach driving to your beach house. That is why this year I plan to

become a much better student and get all A’s this year and maybe some B’s. I plan to pull myself

out of this hole that I dug and get back on the right track. I would absolutely love it if I could

make the principals list for my mom so she can see that I am doing better now, because she has

done everything for me. I would also definitely love to be off probation because I would

definitely prefer to be here next year. For me these goals are definitely attainable and I believe
they will happen. While trying to complete these goals however I will definitely have a few

obstacles to jump through as I go. One of which would be my horrible ability to procrastinate,

which has always been one of my biggest problems since I started school. I need to be aware of

the workload that I have this year and plan my time accordingly to where I can provide the best

work possible. I also need to stay focused. Last year I lost my focus very quickly and very fast

which is why I'm in this class today. I have to be able to keep pushing myself and make school

my top priority over everything else. I feel like over this semester if I can learn better time

management I can definitely avoid these obstacles. Over this semester I want to see myself

become more committed to my goals and my own personal health. I want to be able to start

things and finish them rather than starting something for a few days then forgetting about it. I

also want to see myself grow more as a person and become more involved with different people

and within the college community itself. Throughout this semester in this class I believe that it

can be very beneficial. One of the biggest things I would like to learn which was discussed

earlier in this paper is time management. Since I have started working 30 hours a week and going

to school full time as well I have realized how important time management really is. Without

time management you can become very stressed really fast which is never a good thing. Large

amounts of stress could lead me back to where I was last year. I would also like to learn more

about how I can be more productive with my time, like which studying styles can be more

productive than others. I believe that this class can show me these tips and tricks and help me out

a lot. Over this semester I can't imagine anything other than success. I have big plans for myself

and unlike last semester I won't lose focus again. I want to be the absolute best at everything that

I do and that might not happen for some things, but it's definitely worth a shot, because I have
something to prove to myself as well as my family. I hope that by the end of this year and even

this semester that I can make my family proud and most importantly myself.