Word of the Week: Perspective
by Haleigh Howell, GMC Prep Cadet
Perspective is a particular attitude toward, or way of regarding something according to the dictionary. However, I believe that the meaning is much deeper than that. Perspective to me is getting a new outlook on your life or on current situations. It can be demonstrated when you are stuck in life and choose to look in a different direction in order to find a solution. It is simply changing your point of view to promote positivity on a topic. If you are anything like me, you constantly are thinking negatively about every situation possible. That is why it is tremendously important for people like us to get those negative thoughts out of our heads and think with a new perspective. In one of my all-time favorite movies Soul Surfer, the character Sarah Hill said something that will stay with me forever. She said, “it’s hard to look at things that are too close.” The character then urged her audience to get a new perspective on things in order to tackle issues that they are struggling with.
Throughout my life, there have been many instances where I had to choose to get a new perspective while approaching different situations. One of the instances I can easily remember off the top of my head is the lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic. I went from being an extremely busy middle school student with numerous extracurricular activities to doing almost nothing at all. It was a hard adjustment and there were many times that I found myself down about the situation. I wanted to go out, see my friends, and honestly just see people other than my family whom I had spent so much time with during the pandemic. Without knowing how much longer the lockdown would last, I had to simply get a new perspective to help the time pass by. I then started finding multiple things that I enjoyed doing such as staying up late playing
Fortnite with my friends and laying in the sun for hours. Just those few things brought so much positivity to my outlook over the pandemic and ultimately changed my perspective on things.
In our country, there have been many times that we have had to change our perspective on certain cases. We all know that our nation has been through some difficult times over the past few years, causing us to have to change the way that we look and approach certain things. The lockdown was a struggle for everyone causing many adjustments to be made by so many American families. Instead of thinking about how we could not go out, we got to spend actual quality time with our families strengthening so many bonds. Those are just a few examples of the many ways we can all change our perspectives in a positive way. It can ultimately change our lives for the better to approach the world with an open mind and a new perspective.
