Climb Your Cliffs: Do Not Give Up
Author: Sahar Abid (7th grade student)
Imagine you decide that one day you are going to go climb a cliff. And that one day is today. You have all the things you need with you: water, food, a rope, a harness, a tent and other stuff you need when you have to climb a cliff. You put on the harness and tie yourself to the cliff. You take a deep breath and start climbing.
15 minutes later, you are sweating. Your hands are red and they are blistering. You’re almost at the top of the cliff but it’s too hard and you want to give up. You decided to leave because it was too hard. You start climbing down the cliff, which was meant to be easier than climbing up.
A few minutes later, you look down at the ground below you. May I remind you, you are also scared of heights. You don’t want to fall and get hurt. You see how far you are from the ground and start having a panic attack. You question why you decided to climb the cliff in the first place; It was to challenge yourself — you also thought it would be a neat story to tell your grandkids. But this doesn’t matter because you can’t tell your grandkids anything if you are dead. You suddenly hear something snap and finally realize it was the rope that was connecting you to the cliff. You try to hold on to the cliff but you can’t. You look down one last time and fall to your death. That may have been a bit too graphic. But you probably get the point by now.
DO. NOT. GIVE. UP.
You don’t help anyone by giving up. We all have hard decisions to make and do but don’t let that get the best of you. We’re all climbing a cliff. Some cliffs are harder to climb than others. But no matter how hard it is to climb your cliff, don’t give up. Don’t give up because there’s a reward for everything. You may think what you are doing is pointless but it’s not. Giving up doesn’t help you.
Because accomplishing something takes work. Giving up doesn’t.
Only when you look down at the ground, you’ll see that giving up was not the right choice. People give up because it’s easier than accomplishing something. Because accomplishing something takes work. Giving up doesn’t.
Accomplishing something gets you something or somewhere. Giving up doesn’t. Accomplishing something makes you feel good about yourself. Giving up doesn’t. Giving up just makes it so that you can’t accomplish anything. That’s what it does. You could have climbed to the top of the cliff but you didn’t because you didn’t feel good.
Going through the process of doing anything is going to be hard. Studying for a test is hard, but don’t give up after 30 minutes of studying and wing your test. If you kept on studying you could’ve gotten an +A and raised your grade. But instead you got a -C and your grade got lowered. So what did you get out of giving up. Nothing, that’s the answer.
Climb your cliff no matter how blistered your hands are. No matter how cold it is. No matter how tall it is.
So please, don’t give up. At the moment it may seem like the easiest option but you will regret it later. Climb your cliff no matter how blistered your hands are. No matter how cold it is. No matter how tall it is. Because in the long run, giving up doesn’t help. So don’t give up. Accomplish your goal. And hey, it could even be a a neat story to tell your grandkids.
About the Author
Sahar Abid is a 7th grade student from Eckstein Middle School. She is kind, sarcastic and funny. You can count on her to make hard times easier-or more awkward. She loves her mom and dad but can’t say the same for her brother. She has a YouTube channel that totally isn’t cringy at all (insert wink emoji). She loves to read, write, and pick up trash with her friends. She is currently reading They Both Die At The End. Climb Your Cliffs marks Sahar’s first blog post and bio write-up that she independently wrote and published to her mom’s Medium account.
