Ever since I was a little girl, I have always loved to sing. It has been a way for me to express myself. I am lucky enough to have a family that encourages me to follow my dreams and do whatever it takes to help me get there. My mother and my nana both use to sing in church choirs or in school choirs. Most of my uncles could play different instruments and my grandpa played the guitar every chance he could. I come from a very musically inclined family. My first experience singing in front of a group of people was at church when I was around four years old. I was supposed to get up in front of the church and sing a song called “Beautiful” that we had learned in Sunday School. As soon as the music started playing, I froze up and could not go on with it. My mother ended up having to come up and sing the song for me. I don’t really know if I was just to nervous to sing in front of all of those people, or if I was just being my usual stubborn self. I don’t really remember much about me singing, but my mom said that after that it took me a few years to sing in front of people again. A few years later, I started singing again. It was my preschool Christmas play and we had to sing Christmas carols for all of our parents to hear. They started with my age group, because we were the youngest. Singing with them was easy for me. I didn’t mind singing with the rest of my class mates, because I had a group to sing with rather than signing solo. I was still a little timid to sing in front of a large group of people by myself, but after that, I started singing solo again. It helped seeing all of the other students sing their solos with confidence because it made me realize that if they could do it then so could I. In third grade I attended Mountain View Christian School in Oak Hill, West Virginia. At Mountain View we had chapel every Wednesday. Chapel was sort of like a church service for all of the students to go to during the week. We would have to learn scripture verses, and they would point people out each week to recite them. On certain special occasions they would have a certain grade do a skit or sing a song in front of our group’s chapel. They broke up the chapel services into two different groups. The elementary kids would go in the mornings, and the secondary groups (grades 6 through 12) would go in the afternoon. My mom worked at the school so she had talked to my teacher, Mrs. Hoggard, about how much I loved to sing so when it was our grades turn, my teacher asked me if I would sing for that chapel service. I hesitated because I was not sure if I was ready to, but after thinking about it I told her that I would. I never told my mom that I was going to sing because I wanted to surprise her. That day, they were combining our chapel because the speaker couldn’t make it to the morning service because he had to speak at a funeral for one of the members of his church. That meant that students from ages three all the way up to eighteen would be sitting in there watching me, and all of their teachers would be too. I didn’t think that I could do it. This would be my first opportunity to sing solo in front of a large group of people since I was four. I knew that talent wise I was ready for it, but my nervous were up to that yet. The more and more I thought about it, the more excited and ready I was. I kept telling myself I could do it and before I knew it my nerves were gone. When it came time for me to sing all of my nerves came back. I remember sitting there thinking about how embarrassing it would be if I forgot the lyrics to the song, and what would happen if I tripped walking up the stage, especially in front of all the older kids. Finally, they announced my name and I went up to sing. There was no music, and no one else on stage with me. Just me, and everyone staring at me. The lights from the balcony were almost blinding but at the same time comforting because