Put Yourself First

Everyone goes through that stage in their life where a crazy change happens, most often at around the age of 18. This is the coming into adulthood, when you’re trying to find yourself and figure out what to do with your life. When you turn 18, all of a sudden you have a new kind of freedom. Growing up in a strict, religious household, there were so many things that I wanted to do, but couldn’t. The only way I was allowed to do anything fun was lying to my mom and grandparents, telling them I was going to a youth group event, when in reality I was partying. I even went out of my way to create fake permission slips to make it seem like I was really at a church event. I just wanted to have fun like everyone else. Finally getting to experience life a new way was impactful enough to change who I was as a person in all.

At the age of 18, I realized I didn’t have the same religious views. I grew up Catholic and was in a youth group (the Vietnamese Eucharistic Youth Movement) almost all my life. Youth group was the most important part of my life for a really long time. This is because it was the first environment and community that I felt accepted in. I loved it so much, that I became a youth group leader after a couple years of training and full dedication. I felt like this was my first real accomplishment in life, something that I worked so hard for. What changed everything was the realization that my beliefs didn’t match up with the Catholic church anymore… It was so hard to accept and I didn’t want to believe it.

Red scarf = Youth group leader!

My best friend at the time was a strong atheist and always pushed his views on me. We got into so many arguments about religion to the point where we’d stop talking and have to sit in a silent car ride the rest of the time to or from school. His name is Phillip Nguyen, a person who changed my life and the way I see the world. We hung out almost every single day for over three years. We were also neighbors, so it was hard not to see each other so often. It was hard getting into these heated debates, because I started to realize that I had the same beliefs as him. I just didn’t want to face it because of my love for youth group. He was the person who helped me realize that I had full control over my own life. He convinced me that I needed to put what I wanted over what my family wanted out of me.

Both me and Phillip came from strict and religious families that hindered what we wanted to do in life. Being 18 and naive, we both decided to rebel together -- doing things our families didn’t approve of, but not caring because we wanted to live for ourselves and not them. Of course this caused problems in our families because we were both pushing our boundaries with them. This caused us to grow closer together but further away from our families. Phillip’s parents wanted him to go to a university and get a good paying job. Phillip however, has always dreamt of becoming a rapper, something that he knew he had talent in.

We graduated high school and CC together!

Fast forward, we’re both at the age of 22 and he is completely pursuing his dreams. It took a lot of sacrifice because his parents didn’t believe in his dreams of becoming a rapper. They did everything they could to convince him otherwise. But seeing the dedication that he has put into his dreams, they have finally opened up the idea after about five years. Phillip’s rap name is now Wesly, and it’s the name that his friends call him. “Rarely anyone calls me Phillip anymore,” said Wesly. I still call him Phillip though.. That’s the version of him that I know.

Phillip is someone that has inspired me in life and taught me how to be ambitious and passionate. In high school, I had no ambition, no motive, nothing. My goal at the time was to be a teacher and live in an apartment with a little dog. His goals were way different since he wanted to become a rapper. This caused us to have our first falling out, senior year of high school. He didn’t want to be around me anymore because I was such a bad influence to him -- not caring about school and not wanting to. He taught and showed me that there is more to life than what I wanted.

Phillip and I have been friends since we were 14. We’ve seen each other grow and we’ve seen each other fall. We were not friends the full time, as we grew apart three separate times. Each of these times was for the benefit of both of us. Going back to “Put Yourself First,” we both needed to grow apart until we were ready to have each other in our lives again. Before yesterday, me and him haven’t talked for over a year and a half. The person he was before was in a deep and dark place. Now, it’s the complete opposite. So much has happened to help him grow as a person and a rapper.

He spent the last year focusing on himself and his future. “Investing time and energy into myself instead of someone else, no one can take away the knowledge that I learned and the songs that I finished, and that feeling is amazing,” said Wesly. “Rapping and singing is like breathing to me now.” It’s definitely hard to pursue your dreams when other people are telling you it’s not going to happen, but because Wesly never stopped believing in himself, he’s getting to where he needs to be, one step at a time.

I am forever grateful that I’m able to be myself and do what I want for myself. It’s important to have a good relationship with your family, so it can be hard to make these sacrifices. However, after a certain point of rebelling so often, they just get used to it. Because I continuously rebelled for years, my family has learned that no matter if I go out and do the things that I want, at the end of the day I can take care of myself. You can’t depend on your family to make choices for you, because only you know what you truly want. And in the end, it will be worth it.