Highest Potential How to Start Writing Your Personal or College Essay

Our brains are powerful. We have the potential to shift into a positive mindset, but it's not as simple as it sounds. To access a positive mindset and mental toughness under pressure and during setbacks, we need self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and critical thinking skills. So if you're curious about science-backed tools to strengthen your mental resilience, you're in the right place. Welcome to the Mind Body Space Podcast, where I aim to share actionable tools you can use to reach your highest potential. I'm Dr. Juna Bobby MD. I'm a mom of two kids who love challenges, for the most part, and I'm also a physician, and my specialty is teaching the science of resilience. In this episode, my awesome friend Fiona Murden joins me to share her expertise on human performance. Fiona is an award-winning author and Chartered UK Organizational Psychologist who works with top-level executives and leaders.

So it's that time of year, there's a lot of college applications going out and kids are really stressed about writing their personal essay. And it always seems like it takes forever to figure out what they want to write about, or it takes a lot of iterations. Generally, these kids are 17 or 18 years old and they have a huge problem writing these essays. Sophia and I are gonna talk today about maybe 3 questions that we could boil it down to, to trigger some self-awareness when we're trying to write something like this. So generally they have to write something that reflects something about themselves that's not reflected in the rest of the application. So there's a ton of questions asking about every extracurricular and every award you've had, and basically if you're really great at something, you've already written about it in the rest of the application. So now this essay comes, and it's about what do you really want them to know about you. And these people may never meet you, so at that point they're looking to see why they would want you on campus. What are you going to contribute as a person, and would they enjoy hanging out with you? I think that's the real question, and One of the things that get really in the way is that a lot of the kids start asking things like, "Oh, but if I say that, then they're gonna think I'm a loser," or, you know, "If I talk about that mistake, they're gonna think that, you know, I'm not good at anything." And so they start to get into this mindset of the admissions officer reading it and criticizing them. So I tend to tell the kids to try to think of a situation where they changed or evolved, or an experience that changed their perspective, because they really want to see their mental process, you know, their cognitive process, how they process the world. And if you can convey that in a very short 650-word essay, it adds so much to the application. Good morning.

Hi.

Hi.

So good to see you.

I'm good, thanks. How are you? Shall I jump in with my thoughts on this?

Yes, yes, absolutely.

So the first thing I think is, is start from a place where you're not thinking about the college admissions, you're not thinking about trying to show who you are, you're not thinking about what questions they're asking, where have you failed, where have you done this, where have you done— park all of that. And you think about yourself. And this is where your starting point comes from. And I say this partly from how you write a book or anything like that, because you look at writing a book and you think 'Oh my goodness, how am I going to come up with 120,000 words?' And if you, if you have that mindset, it, it immobilizes you. You can't get on with anything. And so you start by just writing something and, and not worrying about what it— whether it's going to impress anyone, whether it's the right thing or the wrong thing.

So don't think about the end at first, you're saying? Just kind of start.

Yeah, because once you've got something, so it could be you could end up with 1,500 words, 2,000 words, it's a jumbled mess, but you've got something down then. Then you can refine it and you can pull out the key points, but you need something to work with to start from, right? And if you're really, really stuck, there are different things you can do. So there's one thing is to draw your timeline. Oh, so it's to get a piece of paper, A4 piece of paper, and on it you mark the main things that have happened in your life.

I love it.

So, I was born, my baby brother or sister arrived, my parents divorced, you know, and it could be that you look at it and you think, well, there's nothing significant there, but plot it, okay, higher or lower depending on how it felt for you. It'd be higher if it was like a real high point and really low, so, if it was something that was really hard. So, it might be that you think, 'Ah, you know, it's great that I had a baby brother or sister,' or that might be awful. So this is very much your take.

So your emotions, your emotional reaction to these episodes. Yeah.

I love it.

I love the timeline idea. That's great.

So then you've got this thing that, that's sort of like a little map where you can see the things that have been hard and Then you can start thinking, "Well, what did I do then? What did I do to cope with that? How did I respond to that? And what did I learn from that?" If it was hard or if it was negative. And if it's a high, it's like, "Why was it a high? What was it about that that made it a high for me?" And this is where it's talking about you as an individual, because for example, my big brother, I was born on his birthday, 5 years after he was born. And he says it's the best, best birthday present he ever had. Oh, but you know, another big brother could say, oh my God, you were born on my birthday and you ruined my birthday, and every single year you ruined it. And so what it's telling you is something about my brother. And that's what you're trying to do in these essays. It's the same circumstance, might look like nothing, but what did it mean to you?

Yeah.

And how did it impact the way you felt and what you did and the way you see the world?

That's awesome, I love it. I think with college essays you want to show some sort of evolution of thought, so you might want to start at a certain point or, you know, show that you change perspective about that same thing. So what you're saying, you know, your own experience, but maybe your experience shifts with maturity or, you know, some new knowledge that you're learning.

Yeah, but one of my stepfamily was not I didn't have a great relationship with them when I was growing up.

Okay.

Someone said to me the other day, how can you be so— how can you love them so much and be so forgiving of that? It's like, well, you know, that's a process I've been through, and it wasn't a quick process. And if you've got a situation as a kid where you're one of your parents at the moment you hate them, or one of your step-parents or step-siblings But you may have shifted a little bit. You might have thought, do you know what, well, I hate them and I hate how they make me feel. I can kind of understand that now. And even that explanation is saying something about you, your cognitive process, how you see the world, how you have evolved, and also shows a great deal of insight into yourself. But if it makes you feel too vulnerable, steer away from those things, you know. Think about the things that make your heart sing? What are the things that you kind of get lost in time with?

What are the—

and why, why do you love them so much?

So ask yourself questions.

Yeah. And, and I mean, what Tasha Urich would say, um, she wrote— I think her book's called Insight. It's a New York Times bestseller. And she also did a great TED Talk. Well, she's done two TED Talks actually. Okay. But her second one was on specifically on self-awareness. And actually it's about this topic, which is she says, ask what, not why.

Ask what, not why. Okay, at first ask what.

So what we look at with ourselves, if we start thinking, why do I think like that? Why, why did I— why, why was that so hard for me? Oh, why couldn't I get my head around that? Why aren't I better at that? We can get ourselves tied in real knots. And so doing this for college applications could get you in that place.

Yeah.

Whereas she'd say, what?

So you get you stuck.

Yeah.

When you say why, why Why, why me? Why did I do that? Like, it's rhetorical. There's no answer.

But if you say, what, what happened to me there? What does that tell me about myself? What did I learn? What have I taken from that? What am I going to do about that moving forward? Those are all really helpful questions.

Awesome. Yeah, that's kind of bringing in factual data. Yeah, it's almost like a reporter saying what happened. Exactly, right? I love that. The other thing I usually tell them to think about is very similar to what you said. You know, think about some memories that really trigger a very pleasant feeling or something that was difficult, like a challenge to get through. So I guess that's what you were asking before, right? So things that stick in our minds from our past usually tend to be emotionally charged, whether it's good or bad. And those are the kinds of situations that you want to think about. And I think I'm saying exactly the same thing you are.

Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I've got a whole host of these questions in my first book, actually, Defining You. So it might be helpful, it might not, for just working through some of those things. But the other thing, the other suggestion I would have, and it doesn't take buying a book or anything, is look at your values. Now, when you, when you say to people, look at your values, they're like, well, where do I start? What do I do? Go onto the internet and find a list of words. Type in something like values, find a list of words, print out that list of words, go through them and circle the ones that resonate with you. So the ones that mean something to you. So, it might be wealth, it might be happiness, it might be honesty, it might be integrity. Just circle them and you may come up with, if it's a list of 100, you might circle 15.

Mm-hmm.

Then leave it. That's the hard bit. Leave it. Yeah. Come back to it the next day and then regroup them. So, you're aiming for 3 groups. So, regroup all of those words into 3 groups. So honesty and integrity, for example, might go together. If someone is oriented towards wealth and status, they might go together. You cluster them together into 3 groups, and then you look at what does that tell me about me and how I see the world. So that's another, a different approach.

Yeah, that's awesome. And we're on such parallel tracks because I give them a list of values in action, which is from positive psychology. There's a, there's a list online. I'm going to put it on under this podcast on my website. So, you know, I usually have them react to the words on it, and it's usually values like courage, compassion, curiosity, and, and those type of things. And whatever, you know, you reflexively are attracted to. And then they can actually take a formal little quiz where it spits out, you know, what your top values are. But after that had, then they can apply it to whatever that situation was that came to mind and look at it from that lens, you know. And let's say somebody has a fascination for miniatures like I do, and a lot of people, um, and why do you love that? Because there's such attention to detail, maybe, and maybe there's so much imagination going on in there, and it's an escape, you know, from real life, but it's an exact replica, exact replica of real life in tiny miniature form. So you can go into depth about that sort of detail that you see in the world. So anything that you have this curiosity for, you can also layer that as another lens onto that situation that you're describing.

Absolutely. And it's, it is that digging deep, and it's get a parent or a friend to ask you questions. And this is where you can use why. So, so you might say— so you know I love snowboarding, do you know? So you might say, why, why, Fi? Why do you love snowboarding? And I say, ah, because it's the exhilaration of going fast.

Why?

Um, because it makes my heart race, it makes me feel alive. I have to concentrate on— I like going down really steep slopes, I have to concentrate the whole time. Why? Well, I've got a slight adrenaline junkie to me and blah blah blah.

Why?

Well, it's interesting because that, you know, it translates to my work because I am very driven. And so I think you can use why on the outside and use what on the questions that are more inside questions, if that makes sense.

Yeah, so tell me why, Fi, why do you like that adrenaline rush down those steep hills on your snowboard?

I think that bit comes down to part of my personality, which is I, I have always had a— I'm thrill-seeking, I'm excitement-seeking. And you, you add in the factors that I love the outdoors, I love the whole culture around snow sports, uh, I, I love mountains, it— I love cold air on my skin. All those sorts of things you add in and you layer on top. But the— I remember actually being asked this by the occupational psychologists who were hiring me into my role at this global consultancy. Um, why have you got such a thrill-seeking streak? Um, and it, you know, and where does your danger lie? And do you, do you worry about danger to other people? Is it just to yourself? So all these things you can keep unpacking and unraveling. And what was interesting there is I will take huge risks when it involves me, but not when it involves anyone else. And what does that say? Well, I care a great deal about other people. So whilst I'm thrill-seeking, I won't jeopardize other people in the process.

But what about yourself then, if you're doing dangerous things? Well, that's—

I mean, that's really interesting. And since I've had kids, I don't do stuff that's nearly as dangerous.

What did you used to do?

Oh, it's just a lot of backcountry where you're going— you get risk of avalanches and things like that.

Oh, wow. Yes. Uh, that's so interesting.

And I mean, we could go into— there's a whole load of, um, research around thrill-seeking and excitement-seeking personality types, and their tolerance levels are higher, which isn't, which isn't necessarily a good thing because particularly when you live in—

depends, right? Adolescents' brains are wired to be more thrill-seeking because it's much more sensitive to that reward trigger. They actually have much higher sensitivity to dopamine.

Yeah.

So you can guide your child to do dangerous things. Well, no, you wouldn't be guiding them to do dangerous things. They would seek dangerous things.

Or you can guide them to do safe things that feel dangerous, like rock climbing, or—

well, that sounds dangerous to me. I guess, I guess with, uh, yeah. Cable and all that, right? I was thinking more like the cerebral type where you go on stage. And especially for adolescents, being on stage and having their peers looking at you or anyone looking at you is heightened anxiety. Or going on a roller coaster, you know? So all of that will give you the same physiology and you could kind of guide it that way as well.

Yeah, that's great. That's a great example. Better than rock climbing.

No, rock climbing is great. I'm just kidding. There's a lot of places where people do it safely.

Yeah.

My friend used to climb all the time and I remember the first time seeing rock climbers on El Capitan. I don't know if you know Yosemite in California and he pointed the people out and he said, look, they're sleeping in hammocks on, are they called puitons, I think, where they screw in the screws and they hang their hammocks.

So yeah, I have a friend who She teaches snowboarding. She lives in the Alps and she teaches snowboarding. And her husband is— they met climbing and they just do the most crazy things. Like, she just sent— how was it, a few years ago? She, she was on— and this, she doesn't do it safely. What is she—

what is she doing?

She posted on Facebook that she was stuck on a ledge on, on, um, Mont Blanc.

Um, oh my God.

And she was going to be stuck there all night. I was like, my God.

And she had Wi-Fi to post? Yeah, that's amazing. The only question, and repetitive question, that comes to my mind when these— when I see people doing these things is how are they going to the bathroom? So I like to stick to hotels.

Well, and you know, there are certain— there are certain places you have to take it with you even if you go.

So, well, I think it— I think those guys on the side of the cliff were just— I don't know. I guess they have bags or something. Anyway, that's, that's a conversation for another, another podcast episode.

That's a different type of experience altogether.

Oh, that's awesome. So let's just sum it up. The first step would be to, I always say brainstorm, which I think that's what you were saying, right? And when you brainstorm, you just let it all come out. You don't even think or judge about what is coming onto paper, but I absolutely recommend putting it on paper. And like you said, you could have somebody else speak to you because that like brings you also out of your own mind and into a cognitive center. So then you can start to brainstorm. And I think we have the same second step, which is to categorize it into buckets of what goes together and then kind of sort it out into an order that makes sense. And I always say add a conclusion at the end that says a little more than just a summary and brings everything together for you.

Sounds good.

Was that your steps? Was— what was your 3?

No, that— I mean, that was the 3. I think there are tools to use. So the, the values— well, there's values piece on your— that you're going to put in the show notes. There's, um, the timeline is quite a nice one.

I love that.

And then thinking of asking what questions internally and why questions externally, if you like.

Externally, meaning somebody else to ask you why?

Absolutely.

Okay.

Whereas when you're doing reflection, stick with the what, not the why.

I love it.

You know, everybody's such a perfectionist. They think that they're gonna spit it out in one sitting, like the Beatles when they would write those hits in 5 minutes. But the Beatles actually played every night for 5 hours for years before they could do these things. So don't expect to have something perfect right away, and that's the biggest obstacle for most people to get started.

It is. And I think with the kids you're talking about who are all very talented, um, there is that tendency, isn't there, to want to get it down right first time. But I'd say from the perspective of writing and having written books, if you got it right first time, people would be questioning what you're doing, because you can always improve. You can always improve the written word. And that, that doesn't mean keep tinkering with it until it you never send it off, but it's getting something down. And it will look rubbish.

Yes, trash. Yes, trash, garbage. Yeah.

And actually, that is the first step, getting anything down and looking at it. And if you look back at anything, oh my God, why did I write that? But you have to start somewhere.

Yeah.

And then you can start editing it and fine-tuning it and adding and taking away. And but If you don't put it down and you don't expect it to be not great the first time you put it down, you're doing yourself a disservice.

I want to talk about the neuroscience of writing in one of these episodes because it is a step-by-step iteration. You can't just— even if you're an experienced writer, you can't just put out the finished product. No, I call it ugly brainstorming.

Yeah, that's good. That's a good description. And you're totally right, you hear top journalists, people that have written their entire life They don't write— they never write it right the first time. Write, write. Write it right, right, right, right, right.

I love it. Thank you so much. That was great. And I think it's going to help a lot of kids who are stuck on writing their essays right now. Or anybody who has writer's block.

Good luck to you all.

Thanks, Fi. We'll see you soon.

See you soon. Take care.

Thank you so much for listening.

I hope you got as much out of it as I did.

To support the creation of this content, subscribe and share this podcast with anyone curious about achieving their highest potential. Go check out Fi's website, fionamurden.com, to find out more about her podcast and award-winning books. And then go on over to mindbodyspace.com to sign up for my newsletter. You'll get tips from my unique neuroscience-based planner and courses developed from over 10 years of experience teaching high-performing students of all ages at Juilliard, NYU, Columbia, Achievement First, and many other organizations. Thanks again for spending this time with me. Until next time, this is Dr. Juna Bobby MD wishing you and your family wellness.