It is all too similar in today’s world: The way people talk, the trends people follow, the interests people have. These tendencies are taking over the common system of choosing our own ways to express ourselves and often leave us with identical copies of one another – copies that disallow us to survive in the game of success.

Creativity gives our world reason. Without it, life would be a simplistic, dull and monotonous phenomenon that would hold unspoken societal rules no one would dare defy. Revealing your voice to the world is an intimidating thought, especially when everyone around you is doing the opposite.

High school can and will be a difficult time in everyone’s life. It does not matter if you are the most popular student at your school or the one who never says a word – now is the time everyone expects us to define ourselves, discover our interests and uncover the hidden meaning behind our happiness. No one really told us how hard it would be, and they certainly never warned us about the great task of separating society’s expectations from our own.

When I hear others say, “I could never pull that off,” I die a little inside. The concept of ‘pulling something off’ does not have any relation to the way you look or your popularity status. The ability to stand out is not derived from the clothes you wear or the words you speak ; rather, it stems from your capability of ignoring who society wants you to be and showing the world who you truly are.

As someone who would rather watch and observe than talk and socialize, I discover quite a lot about who people are pretending to be in contrast to who they truly are. It is not a crime to put on a different face in public, follow the popular people’s judgement or soak in others’ ideas – in fact, most people resort to doing this in a world where it is silently encouraged. I say silently encouraged because, although the common person will never tell someone to change who they are, it is something that is socially and frequently accepted by those who are unaware they are even strengthening its grasp on society.

Although it is easy to fall beneath this universal trap of self expression, it is up to the individual to identify and act on the realization that contributing personal voice in a silent world will change the way stereotypes are advocated to the public – and may, eventually, change the world in the process.