Who most inspires you?
A guest essay argues that Shohei Ohtani and his magnificent baseball season can reconnect us all to our own potential for greatness. Who does that for you?
Have you been following Shohei Ohtani’s record-breaking season for the Los Angeles Dodgers? In the guest essay “What Shohei Ohtani and His Magnificent Season Mean for You,” Brad Stulberg explains what makes it so exceptional:
On Thursday, Sept. 19, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani became the first player to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in a single season. During his barrier-breaking game against the Miami Marlins, Ohtani also batted six-for-six, hit three home runs and drove home 10. Commentators called it the greatest single game in the greatest single season in Major League Baseball’s 121-year history.
As the end of season approached, Ohtani increased his record to 53 home runs and 56 stolen bases. Adding to the singularity of the moment is Ohtani’s position: He is a pitcher. Not since Babe Ruth has such a great pitcher also been such a great hitter — let alone such a great base runner. Base stealers tend to be lean and fast. Sluggers tend to be big and powerful. And pitchers are usually neither of those things. Ohtani is both.
Mr. Stulberg argues that we can all find motivation in Ohtani’s greatness, writing:
To witnesses, this athletic ability can seem, at first, simply unattainable — a phenomenon out of reach for the rest of us. And yet much as we do with art, nature or other forms of beauty, we can actively engage with this kind of greatness, appreciating it not only for the feelings of awe it elicits but also for how it can inspire even the least athletic among us to accomplish more in our own lives.
Human inspiration has long been a subject of investigation. A study a decade ago co-written by the psychologists Victoria Oleynick and Todd Thrash divided how humans perceive inspiration into two categories: inspired by and inspired to. In layperson’s terms, we can find ourselves inspired by a peak performer like Ohtani, and then we can use that inspiration as motivation to strive for our own goals and get the best out of ourselves.
That means even if we never pick up a baseball, let alone run 90 feet anywhere close to as fast as Ohtani, observing an athlete like him at the height of his ability can take us out of our day-to-day and remind us of what is possible. It’s akin to tasting the creation of a master chef, walking around a celebrated architect’s stunning building or hearing a genre-bending singer’s perfect pitch. In all these instances we feel greatness and we are reminded of an impulse to create, to make progress and to flourish.
My students, read the entire essay and then tell me:
Are you a fan of Ohtani? What is your reaction to his remarkable season? Do you find it mind-boggling or awe-inducing? Maybe inspiring for your own life?
Who most inspires you? Your answer could be someone famous you look up to, like an athlete, celebrity, artist, musician or author — or it could be someone you know personally, like a parent, teacher, coach or friend.
What about this person do you find inspiring? Maybe it’s what the person has accomplished or the way the person lives. Can you think of a specific moment you were awed by this person?
In what ways has this person, as Mr. Stulberg writes, made you connect to your “own potential for greatness in ways both large and small”? What goals has the person motivated you to strive for in your own life?
Mr. Stulberg has his own explanation for why we are amazed by people like Ohtani. Why do you think we are so moved when we witness someone do something extraordinarily well?
The person that I would say inspires me the most would have to be Patrick Kane. Patrick Kane is debatably the best hockey player of this decade. He proves this by winning 3 Stanley cups in 5 years he also won the conn smythe in 2013 after winning his 2nd stanley cup the conn smythe is given to the mvp of the playoffs. Although Kane has faced a ton of challenges and controversity in his life and career he powered through them all and didnt let any thing stop him from perusing his dream of being the best nhl player. A lot of people inspire me and help guide me to be a better person, but there’s only one person who I truly can say inspires me. That person is my Dad. He is someone who I look up to everyday and he is the single person in my life who truly inspires me to be better everyday. My Dad everyday when I come home from school asks me how my day went and what I did today that made me better than yesterday. Beyond that he is my one and only father who I thank everyday for making me the man I am today and showing me the ropes of life and teaching me how to be a better person each and every day. The people that inspire me most are both of my older sisters. They both are super caring and always will help me whenever I need it. They are both super successful in their jobs and were also successful in highschool. They both did the same sports that I do and always like to help me with volleyball or track. This all shows why my older sisters inspire me. I look up to my dad because he is a hard-working person. He works so hard to get me and my sister and everything that he did not have so that's why he is that someone I look up to; he served our country and now he is a cop. I hope to be just like him in the near future.
Out of everyone in my life I look up to my Grandfather the most. My Grandpa on my mom's side has always been there for our family. He loves to grill and basically feed us every Sunday, he calls it "Sunday Tradition." He still grills awesome steak or burger for us to this day, on Sundays me and my sister drive to his house and lounge around, eat, watch some sports, and then have some dessert like homemade ice cream. My Grandpa inspires me so much and will forever inspire me to become a better person.
I am not that big of a fan of Ohtani. However, his season was incredible. When he won MVP on the Angels, I thought that would be his peak, as he was the best pitcher in the league and a top 5 hitter. Now he is the best hitter in the league, and we have never seen anything like it before. So, I do find it inspiring because it shows that hard work can achieve anything. Growing up he had to work very hard - hours in the batting cages, going to the gym every day, thousands of pitches thrown - in order to get where he is. Tiger Woods and my mom most inspire me. I find the fact that Tiger Woods was never really privileged. He had to go from the ground up, and he ended up going to Stanford and being the greatest golfer ever. My favorite moment of his is when he won the US Open on a broken leg, which was a greatness defining moment for him in his career. My mom inspires me because she guides my decisions. Whenever I am in a predicament, I ask her what she would do or ask myself what she would do. Tiger Woods has inspired me to play college golf, and my mom has inspired me to keep being myself and to never give up. I think we are moved because we have never seen it before. Whenever we see something like what Shohei did, we have never seen it before so we become somewhat shocked by the event. It sort of motivates us, and makes us feel inspired. The person who inspires me the most is my aunt. My aunt is very caring to anyone and everyone who needs help. I can tell my aunt everything, and she will listen and help me out. My aunt spent so much time raising me and my sister when we were younger when my mom couldn't. She always pushes me to my limits but she knows when to have me stop so i don't push myself too hard. My aunt is the person I inspire the most.
The person who influenced and inspired me the most is my dad because he is a hard working and he wants me siblings and I to do the very best we could at whatever we do. He wants to set my family and I up for success for when we are older and even if he is a little hard on us at times, he wants us to do our very best at whatever we are doing. Whenever my siblings and I want to try something and do something new, he will be in our support no matter what and encourages us to do more. Even though me and my father played different sports while growing up, he encourages me to try new things and he wants to help me get better at things I want to do to be the very best I can be. My mom inspires me to be a better person because she always sets a good example on daily tasks. She always works hard and stays positive even when things are not the best. When I see her do that, it makes me want to try to stay positive through difficult times. She encourages me to do my best in everything, like school and sports. The always finds a way to make it to all my games and help me on a homework assignment I get stuck on. Whenever I feel down she's always there to support me and almost always cheer me up. My mom also teaches me to be kind and help others, allowing to be more caring. She’s someone I can always count on; as she is always available when I am sad for need an extra hand. She inspires me to grow and improve, allowing me to become the best version of myself. I look up to my grandpa on my mom’s side of the family. I look up to him and aspire to work hard and work up to as much quality of work as he does, if not better than him. He’s taught me basically everything I know when it comes to handling tools and working on machinery. I love sprint cars and working on teams myself because of him working on them in the past, and now on the rear ends. Not only is he a hard worker to follow, but he is respectful to anyone, and is always willing to help out.
The people who inspire me the most are my family and friends. I play with my friends all the time, but I stay home with my mom, too. She helps me through tough times. My friends do that, too, and if they are feeling sad, then I see what is wrong. I have to watch my baby brother sometimes, and he comes and watches me play games.
I have two people that inspire me the most, which are my sister and my best friend. My sister is my role model because she is the nicest person I know and always is gentle with others, but she is kind of a doormat. She is also very dedicated to everything she does and works hard. She helps me to be a kinder person and more sensitive with others' emotions. Even when she is busy in college, she doesn't hesitate to call me when I ask her to. I always rant to her; she always listens to me. My best friend is kind of the opposite of my sister. She is not afraid to stand up for herself when someone wrongs her, which I really admire. She always tells it how it is and speaks her mind. She is very funny and energetic. She never tells me a white lie which I like because that means she genuinely cares about me not embarrassing myself. When we are together, we will talk on and on for hours. I look up to these two people that I love, even if they have contrasting personalities.
I think that a person that someone looks up to is someone who can be anyone. It does not just have to be a famous sports player that fit the criteria of being famous and having many achievements. But this is not true, it can be anyone who you look up to. There is no criteria for someone who inspires you, so for me that is my dad a person who is hard working, kind, and happy. He worked hard everyday; he became a successful doctor. If I am ever feeling lazy he inspires me to keep working hard. He is a great influence and only does things for the better of me and this is why my dad is the person who influence me.
The person that inspires me the most is probably my mom. She has always been the person I go to when I'm happy or sad or excited. I go to her with everything. ever since I was little I wanted to grow up and be like my mom. She is funny, easy to talk to, respectful and smart. Not smart in the ways of school necessarily but just with the choices she makes the things she says and the way she responds to situations. She would drop anything for our family. She makes me and my siblings better people each day just by us being around her. That is why my mom inspires me the most. The person that most inspires me is probably my mom. My mom has always been there for me and is always a person I can talk to and tell anything to. If I ask to get a ride or tell my mom to go get something she most likely will do it and shes been such an inspirational person through my whole life. She has spent so much time and effort on me and my siblings. That is why I chose my mom as someone who most inspires you.
There are multiple people who I look up to. My family, friends, and athletes. I mostly look up to my dad because he pushes me to be my best and get to my full potential. He also gives me advice before and after football and basketball games. Athletes who inspire me are the ones who got doubted when they were younger and they weren't that big and they still made it to the NFL or NBA. That is who I look up to.
Whenever I am asked to write about who inspires me or who I look up to, I struggle to select just one inspirational person in my life. I could pick any one of my family members, my favorite singer, and my friends, all of whom I look up to immensely. However, rather than picking just one person, I would like to choose everyone. I am continuously inspired by everyone in my life. Whether it be my mom motivating me with her ability to listen or my stepmom's ability to push through every situation she comes across and be one of the strongest women I know. My dad gives the best advice and is my rock, and my sisters never fail to smile, make me laugh, and inspire me to keep going. My friends are some of the best people I have ever met and never fail to make me feel alive. Even random strangers inspire me—the ones who spread awareness on subjects I am uneducated about, the girl who painted a beautiful mural downtown, and even the elderly couple who hold hands and inspire me to believe in love and life. Frankly, picking one person I am most inspired by would only undermine the many others who influence me every day.
The person that inspires me the most is my mom. My mom is the most inspiring person to me for many different reasons. Although, both her kindness and selflessness is what stands out the most to me. She always puts others' needs before her own and would drop everything for her family. She is also an extremely hard worker and has built a business on her own and from scratch, which has shown me the kind of person I want to be in the future. Similarly to the idea in the text, I can “use that inspiration as motivation to strive for [my] own goals and get the best out of [myself].” Not only is she my biggest role model, she has never failed to be a shoulder to lean on when I need it the most. She has supported me through the hardest times and has been by my side no matter the situation or circumstance. I am incredibly thankful to have a mom like her to look up to everyday who inspires me to be a better person by simply just being herself.
I feel like the person who inspires me most is my dad. He’s been the person who both pushed me to do things I didn’t want, and supported me in doing things that I enjoy. I know that he wants me to do good in the future, which is why he always pushed me to do my best in school. He also supported me when I played softball, he used to play baseball so softball and watching baseball was always something we bonded over. “In all these instances we feel greatness and we are reminded of an impulse to create, to make progress and to flourish” is something that I feel is very true regarding to seeing the people who inspire us most, and how just watching and understanding them, in this case me with my dad, helps me want to flourish in my life (Stulberg). Throughout my life, knowing my father’s background and all the hardships in his child, teen and young adult years, him being able to move past all of that, some of those things being living in not the best part of Chicago, him being a first generation America, and being in the military, all of that inspires me. Him being able to come this far from all those hardships, really inspires me.
Who most inspires me is Emma Goldman. She was a socialist philosopher and activist who fled imperial and later soviet Russia for their authoritarianism. As well as writing theory for and advocating for a libertarian socialist society she fought for her principals. She organized draft evasion, and fought it in court. For her protests and direct action she faced persecution multiple times. Despite this, she persisted in her beliefs in spite of this, and that’s what I look up to her for just as much as her beliefs.
My biggest inspiration would most likely be both of my parents. While my parents can be both amazing and infuriating sometimes, they’re still a great source of my motivation and inspiration for the stuff I love to do. My mom is the most sweet, caring, and patience person in the whole world while my dad is impatient, sweet, and tough. My parents were both kinda young when they had me and neither set of grandparents didn’t make it any easier. But they eventually found a way to balance their traits when raising me and my siblings. Whenever a subject was sensitive or emotional, my mom would step in and comfort us but when a subject was serious or laborious, my dad would step in and teach us what we needed to know. Although that would be their main job most of the time, there were a few times when they would dip toes on either side and still made it work. It’s made me into a hard-working person who puts literally everything that he can into a job or a task while being emotionally stable enough to help others along the way and be positive most of the time. Even though sometimes when me and my dad don’t see eye to eye, it because a screaming match on who’s right and who’s wrong and with my mom it also becomes a screaming match but it’s whose logic makes more sense, my parents and I always eventually forgive each other and learn from each other. But even with all of the arguments I’ve had with my parents, the stuff they went through, the stuff they did; inspires me greatly.
The person that inspires me the most in my life is my dad. My dad is both hardworking and lazy, he could be doing the most grueling work imaginable one day and the next he just sleeps the entire day. In the guest essay, they say that “In layperson’s terms, we can find ourselves inspired by a peak performer like Ohtani, and then we can use that inspiration as motivation to strive for our own goals and get the best out of ourselves” and that is much of what I see in my dad. He inspires me because of how he is always set on whatever his job is that he wants to get done and then has time to relax and cool down. He makes me want to follow suit in how I handle my school work as I’m not the most responsible student, but when I see my dad pull it off with the kind of work he does it makes me want to straighten myself up and get things done. My dad agrees in this sentiment of education and wants to make sure that I stay committed to my studies and pushes me forward to try and achieve these goals in whatever way he can even though he can’t speak English very well, and that impacts me as I want to be someone as committed as him.
As cliche as it is, the person who inspires me the most is my mother. Even though she’s my mother and she raised me, I can see how completely different our lives have been compared to each other. As an immigrant she had a very different upbringing than the one she gave me, and even living in America her life has been completely different than my own here. As her daughter, I’m both grateful and pitiful for the challenges she’s faced throughout life.
Have you been following Shohei Ohtani’s record-breaking season for the Los Angeles Dodgers? In the guest essay “What Shohei Ohtani and His Magnificent Season Mean for You,” Brad Stulberg explains what makes it so exceptional:
On Thursday, Sept. 19, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani became the first player to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in a single season. During his barrier-breaking game against the Miami Marlins, Ohtani also batted six-for-six, hit three home runs and drove home 10. Commentators called it the greatest single game in the greatest single season in Major League Baseball’s 121-year history.
As the end of season approached, Ohtani increased his record to 53 home runs and 56 stolen bases. Adding to the singularity of the moment is Ohtani’s position: He is a pitcher. Not since Babe Ruth has such a great pitcher also been such a great hitter — let alone such a great base runner. Base stealers tend to be lean and fast. Sluggers tend to be big and powerful. And pitchers are usually neither of those things. Ohtani is both.
Mr. Stulberg argues that we can all find motivation in Ohtani’s greatness, writing:
To witnesses, this athletic ability can seem, at first, simply unattainable — a phenomenon out of reach for the rest of us. And yet much as we do with art, nature or other forms of beauty, we can actively engage with this kind of greatness, appreciating it not only for the feelings of awe it elicits but also for how it can inspire even the least athletic among us to accomplish more in our own lives.
Human inspiration has long been a subject of investigation. A study a decade ago co-written by the psychologists Victoria Oleynick and Todd Thrash divided how humans perceive inspiration into two categories: inspired by and inspired to. In layperson’s terms, we can find ourselves inspired by a peak performer like Ohtani, and then we can use that inspiration as motivation to strive for our own goals and get the best out of ourselves.
That means even if we never pick up a baseball, let alone run 90 feet anywhere close to as fast as Ohtani, observing an athlete like him at the height of his ability can take us out of our day-to-day and remind us of what is possible. It’s akin to tasting the creation of a master chef, walking around a celebrated architect’s stunning building or hearing a genre-bending singer’s perfect pitch. In all these instances we feel greatness and we are reminded of an impulse to create, to make progress and to flourish.
My students, read the entire essay and then tell me:
Are you a fan of Ohtani? What is your reaction to his remarkable season? Do you find it mind-boggling or awe-inducing? Maybe inspiring for your own life?
Who most inspires you? Your answer could be someone famous you look up to, like an athlete, celebrity, artist, musician or author — or it could be someone you know personally, like a parent, teacher, coach or friend.
What about this person do you find inspiring? Maybe it’s what the person has accomplished or the way the person lives. Can you think of a specific moment you were awed by this person?
In what ways has this person, as Mr. Stulberg writes, made you connect to your “own potential for greatness in ways both large and small”? What goals has the person motivated you to strive for in your own life?
Mr. Stulberg has his own explanation for why we are amazed by people like Ohtani. Why do you think we are so moved when we witness someone do something extraordinarily well?
The person that I would say inspires me the most would have to be Patrick Kane. Patrick Kane is debatably the best hockey player of this decade. He proves this by winning 3 Stanley cups in 5 years he also won the conn smythe in 2013 after winning his 2nd stanley cup the conn smythe is given to the mvp of the playoffs. Although Kane has faced a ton of challenges and controversity in his life and career he powered through them all and didnt let any thing stop him from perusing his dream of being the best nhl player. A lot of people inspire me and help guide me to be a better person, but there’s only one person who I truly can say inspires me. That person is my Dad. He is someone who I look up to everyday and he is the single person in my life who truly inspires me to be better everyday. My Dad everyday when I come home from school asks me how my day went and what I did today that made me better than yesterday. Beyond that he is my one and only father who I thank everyday for making me the man I am today and showing me the ropes of life and teaching me how to be a better person each and every day. The people that inspire me most are both of my older sisters. They both are super caring and always will help me whenever I need it. They are both super successful in their jobs and were also successful in highschool. They both did the same sports that I do and always like to help me with volleyball or track. This all shows why my older sisters inspire me. I look up to my dad because he is a hard-working person. He works so hard to get me and my sister and everything that he did not have so that's why he is that someone I look up to; he served our country and now he is a cop. I hope to be just like him in the near future.
Out of everyone in my life I look up to my Grandfather the most. My Grandpa on my mom's side has always been there for our family. He loves to grill and basically feed us every Sunday, he calls it "Sunday Tradition." He still grills awesome steak or burger for us to this day, on Sundays me and my sister drive to his house and lounge around, eat, watch some sports, and then have some dessert like homemade ice cream. My Grandpa inspires me so much and will forever inspire me to become a better person.
I am not that big of a fan of Ohtani. However, his season was incredible. When he won MVP on the Angels, I thought that would be his peak, as he was the best pitcher in the league and a top 5 hitter. Now he is the best hitter in the league, and we have never seen anything like it before. So, I do find it inspiring because it shows that hard work can achieve anything. Growing up he had to work very hard - hours in the batting cages, going to the gym every day, thousands of pitches thrown - in order to get where he is. Tiger Woods and my mom most inspire me. I find the fact that Tiger Woods was never really privileged. He had to go from the ground up, and he ended up going to Stanford and being the greatest golfer ever. My favorite moment of his is when he won the US Open on a broken leg, which was a greatness defining moment for him in his career. My mom inspires me because she guides my decisions. Whenever I am in a predicament, I ask her what she would do or ask myself what she would do. Tiger Woods has inspired me to play college golf, and my mom has inspired me to keep being myself and to never give up. I think we are moved because we have never seen it before. Whenever we see something like what Shohei did, we have never seen it before so we become somewhat shocked by the event. It sort of motivates us, and makes us feel inspired. The person who inspires me the most is my aunt. My aunt is very caring to anyone and everyone who needs help. I can tell my aunt everything, and she will listen and help me out. My aunt spent so much time raising me and my sister when we were younger when my mom couldn't. She always pushes me to my limits but she knows when to have me stop so i don't push myself too hard. My aunt is the person I inspire the most.
The person who influenced and inspired me the most is my dad because he is a hard working and he wants me siblings and I to do the very best we could at whatever we do. He wants to set my family and I up for success for when we are older and even if he is a little hard on us at times, he wants us to do our very best at whatever we are doing. Whenever my siblings and I want to try something and do something new, he will be in our support no matter what and encourages us to do more. Even though me and my father played different sports while growing up, he encourages me to try new things and he wants to help me get better at things I want to do to be the very best I can be. My mom inspires me to be a better person because she always sets a good example on daily tasks. She always works hard and stays positive even when things are not the best. When I see her do that, it makes me want to try to stay positive through difficult times. She encourages me to do my best in everything, like school and sports. The always finds a way to make it to all my games and help me on a homework assignment I get stuck on. Whenever I feel down she's always there to support me and almost always cheer me up. My mom also teaches me to be kind and help others, allowing to be more caring. She’s someone I can always count on; as she is always available when I am sad for need an extra hand. She inspires me to grow and improve, allowing me to become the best version of myself. I look up to my grandpa on my mom’s side of the family. I look up to him and aspire to work hard and work up to as much quality of work as he does, if not better than him. He’s taught me basically everything I know when it comes to handling tools and working on machinery. I love sprint cars and working on teams myself because of him working on them in the past, and now on the rear ends. Not only is he a hard worker to follow, but he is respectful to anyone, and is always willing to help out.
The people who inspire me the most are my family and friends. I play with my friends all the time, but I stay home with my mom, too. She helps me through tough times. My friends do that, too, and if they are feeling sad, then I see what is wrong. I have to watch my baby brother sometimes, and he comes and watches me play games.
I have two people that inspire me the most, which are my sister and my best friend. My sister is my role model because she is the nicest person I know and always is gentle with others, but she is kind of a doormat. She is also very dedicated to everything she does and works hard. She helps me to be a kinder person and more sensitive with others' emotions. Even when she is busy in college, she doesn't hesitate to call me when I ask her to. I always rant to her; she always listens to me. My best friend is kind of the opposite of my sister. She is not afraid to stand up for herself when someone wrongs her, which I really admire. She always tells it how it is and speaks her mind. She is very funny and energetic. She never tells me a white lie which I like because that means she genuinely cares about me not embarrassing myself. When we are together, we will talk on and on for hours. I look up to these two people that I love, even if they have contrasting personalities.
I think that a person that someone looks up to is someone who can be anyone. It does not just have to be a famous sports player that fit the criteria of being famous and having many achievements. But this is not true, it can be anyone who you look up to. There is no criteria for someone who inspires you, so for me that is my dad a person who is hard working, kind, and happy. He worked hard everyday; he became a successful doctor. If I am ever feeling lazy he inspires me to keep working hard. He is a great influence and only does things for the better of me and this is why my dad is the person who influence me.
The person that inspires me the most is probably my mom. She has always been the person I go to when I'm happy or sad or excited. I go to her with everything. ever since I was little I wanted to grow up and be like my mom. She is funny, easy to talk to, respectful and smart. Not smart in the ways of school necessarily but just with the choices she makes the things she says and the way she responds to situations. She would drop anything for our family. She makes me and my siblings better people each day just by us being around her. That is why my mom inspires me the most. The person that most inspires me is probably my mom. My mom has always been there for me and is always a person I can talk to and tell anything to. If I ask to get a ride or tell my mom to go get something she most likely will do it and shes been such an inspirational person through my whole life. She has spent so much time and effort on me and my siblings. That is why I chose my mom as someone who most inspires you.
There are multiple people who I look up to. My family, friends, and athletes. I mostly look up to my dad because he pushes me to be my best and get to my full potential. He also gives me advice before and after football and basketball games. Athletes who inspire me are the ones who got doubted when they were younger and they weren't that big and they still made it to the NFL or NBA. That is who I look up to.
Whenever I am asked to write about who inspires me or who I look up to, I struggle to select just one inspirational person in my life. I could pick any one of my family members, my favorite singer, and my friends, all of whom I look up to immensely. However, rather than picking just one person, I would like to choose everyone. I am continuously inspired by everyone in my life. Whether it be my mom motivating me with her ability to listen or my stepmom's ability to push through every situation she comes across and be one of the strongest women I know. My dad gives the best advice and is my rock, and my sisters never fail to smile, make me laugh, and inspire me to keep going. My friends are some of the best people I have ever met and never fail to make me feel alive. Even random strangers inspire me—the ones who spread awareness on subjects I am uneducated about, the girl who painted a beautiful mural downtown, and even the elderly couple who hold hands and inspire me to believe in love and life. Frankly, picking one person I am most inspired by would only undermine the many others who influence me every day.
The person that inspires me the most is my mom. My mom is the most inspiring person to me for many different reasons. Although, both her kindness and selflessness is what stands out the most to me. She always puts others' needs before her own and would drop everything for her family. She is also an extremely hard worker and has built a business on her own and from scratch, which has shown me the kind of person I want to be in the future. Similarly to the idea in the text, I can “use that inspiration as motivation to strive for [my] own goals and get the best out of [myself].” Not only is she my biggest role model, she has never failed to be a shoulder to lean on when I need it the most. She has supported me through the hardest times and has been by my side no matter the situation or circumstance. I am incredibly thankful to have a mom like her to look up to everyday who inspires me to be a better person by simply just being herself.
I feel like the person who inspires me most is my dad. He’s been the person who both pushed me to do things I didn’t want, and supported me in doing things that I enjoy. I know that he wants me to do good in the future, which is why he always pushed me to do my best in school. He also supported me when I played softball, he used to play baseball so softball and watching baseball was always something we bonded over. “In all these instances we feel greatness and we are reminded of an impulse to create, to make progress and to flourish” is something that I feel is very true regarding to seeing the people who inspire us most, and how just watching and understanding them, in this case me with my dad, helps me want to flourish in my life (Stulberg). Throughout my life, knowing my father’s background and all the hardships in his child, teen and young adult years, him being able to move past all of that, some of those things being living in not the best part of Chicago, him being a first generation America, and being in the military, all of that inspires me. Him being able to come this far from all those hardships, really inspires me.
Who most inspires me is Emma Goldman. She was a socialist philosopher and activist who fled imperial and later soviet Russia for their authoritarianism. As well as writing theory for and advocating for a libertarian socialist society she fought for her principals. She organized draft evasion, and fought it in court. For her protests and direct action she faced persecution multiple times. Despite this, she persisted in her beliefs in spite of this, and that’s what I look up to her for just as much as her beliefs.
My biggest inspiration would most likely be both of my parents. While my parents can be both amazing and infuriating sometimes, they’re still a great source of my motivation and inspiration for the stuff I love to do. My mom is the most sweet, caring, and patience person in the whole world while my dad is impatient, sweet, and tough. My parents were both kinda young when they had me and neither set of grandparents didn’t make it any easier. But they eventually found a way to balance their traits when raising me and my siblings. Whenever a subject was sensitive or emotional, my mom would step in and comfort us but when a subject was serious or laborious, my dad would step in and teach us what we needed to know. Although that would be their main job most of the time, there were a few times when they would dip toes on either side and still made it work. It’s made me into a hard-working person who puts literally everything that he can into a job or a task while being emotionally stable enough to help others along the way and be positive most of the time. Even though sometimes when me and my dad don’t see eye to eye, it because a screaming match on who’s right and who’s wrong and with my mom it also becomes a screaming match but it’s whose logic makes more sense, my parents and I always eventually forgive each other and learn from each other. But even with all of the arguments I’ve had with my parents, the stuff they went through, the stuff they did; inspires me greatly.
The person that inspires me the most in my life is my dad. My dad is both hardworking and lazy, he could be doing the most grueling work imaginable one day and the next he just sleeps the entire day. In the guest essay, they say that “In layperson’s terms, we can find ourselves inspired by a peak performer like Ohtani, and then we can use that inspiration as motivation to strive for our own goals and get the best out of ourselves” and that is much of what I see in my dad. He inspires me because of how he is always set on whatever his job is that he wants to get done and then has time to relax and cool down. He makes me want to follow suit in how I handle my school work as I’m not the most responsible student, but when I see my dad pull it off with the kind of work he does it makes me want to straighten myself up and get things done. My dad agrees in this sentiment of education and wants to make sure that I stay committed to my studies and pushes me forward to try and achieve these goals in whatever way he can even though he can’t speak English very well, and that impacts me as I want to be someone as committed as him.
As cliche as it is, the person who inspires me the most is my mother. Even though she’s my mother and she raised me, I can see how completely different our lives have been compared to each other. As an immigrant she had a very different upbringing than the one she gave me, and even living in America her life has been completely different than my own here. As her daughter, I’m both grateful and pitiful for the challenges she’s faced throughout life.
