Letters to GSLC's Year 8 students

Dear Year 8's,

Year 9 isn’t scary. I promise you this. But I also promise you that by the end of it you will have grown quite a bit compared to now, whether that is into a better or worse person is up to you. You’ll probably know this already, as I did when I was changing into Year 9, that sometimes it’s not going to be easy. There are people who will try to pull you down out of jealousy and anger or spite. These people probably won’t grow for the better, because their minds aren’t open enough to see that pulling people down isn't what’s really cool or funny.

I still haven’t mastered the art of loving myself. It’s a difficult art to master with certain people constantly around. But I know myself, and as long as you have that, and you don’t plan on changing for the worse, you’ll be fine. Sometimes certain things are hard to look past, certain comments on your body or character, they are demeaning and all in all depressing. But love yourself. Know who you are. Be proud of it and do your best. This is my advice to you.

Stand up for yourself. Fight back.

What l mean by fight back is that there will always be something or someone out there who will try and stop you from doing what you want to do. l believe that we should always fight back against these things that might want to stop us. Year 8's anyone else out there, there is always going to be something that tries to stop you but the most important part is that you don't let them and you fight for the things you want to fight for even if it seems impossible.

Be self-reliant and take responsibility for your actions.

Year 9 is going to be harder than Year 8. You will have to do things yourself, so your going to have to grow up and take responsibility by being self-reliant. In life people are not going to carry you to the finish line and cheer for you. You will need to fight for your goals. This fight can begin with simply not talking to your friends too much in class because this is the start of your future, the start of your fight. Don't blame anyone else for your mistakes, be self-reliant and take responsibility for your actions.

As a side note, I don't recommend playing Fortnite when there are 6 exams in one week.

When going through school you will need to have defiance, but it needs to be in the right place and the right time. Whatever you do, don’t be defiant towards teachers, but be defiant with your opinion in a respectful manner. Always stand by what you think is right and what is wrong in a situation but remember that there’s two sides to every story, so therefore you have to be open-minded.

If you choose to be defiant in terrible situations don’t be surprised when getting shut down immediately. You will be getting closer to Senior School which means you have to be open-minded, defiant (in a good way) and true to yourself. If your not true to yourself this will lead to you not knowing who you are and what path you want to take when leaving school.

Self-belief can have a different meaning to everyone but what every Year 8 soon to be Year 9 needs to know is never stop believing in yourself. Always have faith in yourself that you can do whatever you want as long as you believe in yourself and work hard you WILL achieve your goals.

Never stop believing in your religion. I'm not religious but if you are you should never stop or feel embarrassed because your classmates think it's a bit weird or lame because to you it's special. Believe in what you want and never stop.

Believe in your abilities, dont put yourself down because you didn't get the grade you wanted, use it as motivation to try harder so you don't feel that way again.

Believe in your teachers and educators because they know what they're doing and will do what they can to help you. There's always going to be teachers you don't like or class your find more difficult than others, but just remember it's only a few more years of hard work and you'll be set for the rest of your life.

Year 9 has been tough for me, it's tough for everyone. Never stop believing in yourself and you'll get through it.

Persevere in everything you do. Do not allow the doubtful voice in our mind that says: “oh no that’s not good enough” or “what will people think about me?” to influence your decisions. Try your best and don’t give up because in the end the things that you should of done you will wish you had done. Year 9 goes fast. It’s a bumpy roller coaster and you tend to try and give up but in the end you will be glad you have persevered and you did your best that you can.

You may be the best at one thing but not good in other circumstances. I encourage you to be a Xiomara Batista (a character you will come to know in Year 9 Language and Literature) and mark yourself on your flag and become the best that you can be. You can have people on your side helping you but when your older they are not going to be there for you. So learn to not give up and persevere.

One key message that you should know is that there will be times when you need to stand up for what is right, even though the whole world will be against you and will try to push you down. You need to get back up and show them that you’re going to stand against the wrong and fight instead of taking flight.

The people around you and the people you surround yourself with will test your patience and emotional strength. They may believe that something is right and they will be relentless and argue their point and twist the truth. Nevertheless, you must show them that there is a better way and believe in yourself that you and others can make a change for the better.

You need to persist in what you believe and fight for your place in the world. Even if you are a gamer who likes to live online, you still need to stand against the politicians who want to take others land. Or if you're a member of the military personnel you have to work with your teammates and your family in the ongoing war to stop the Islamic Extremism forces who want to take away women’s rights and free will. There may even be those who want to take you away from your family. These same people will destroy all they can to get what they want.

You need to fight for what is right.

Hello Year 8 student who is going to be Year 9 I am going to say this to you. You are probably going to be fine in Year 8 as it is not that different from Year 9. It is basically the same but a bit harder like Year 7 to Year 8 or Year 6 to Year 7, it just keeps getting progressively harder. Except maybe Year 10, 11 and 12, I can't speak of those because I haven't been a Year 10, 11 or 12 student yet. But that isn't the point, the point is that you will probably be fine.

But if for you Year 8 was really hard and you just read this and thought to yourself "Oh no Year 9 is just going to be like this year but worse that sucks." If this is the case for you then I have to tell you something, you have to be RESILIENT (all caps for emphasis). So that when life knocks you down you can get back up and when you are probably knocked back down again, you stand up and get knocked down again and you keep doing this until you knock the thing that knocked you down in the first place. This is what it means to be resilient.

Even if life is really hard you gotta keep walking and making progress even if you get knocked down and get back up and make a few steps of progress. Congratulations, that is still progress. So don't worry because if Year 8 was really horrible for you and you are worried about Year 9 and think to yourself that you can't do it, think about it you have already survived in Year 8. You are already tough, what's another year going to do?