Preparing for Spirit Week took a lot of internal reflection, because I really had to ask myself: what is spirit?

This idea came to me on the bus one day when my friend simply asked, “Emmy, do you think you are a sensitive person?”

Honestly, I have been asked this question many times, but it is usually with an underlying tone of condescension, and when he asked it with curiosity and care, I thought maybe this is something I don’t have to be ashamed of anymore.

So I said yes, I do think I’m a sensitive person. My whole life, I have been known as someone who experiences their emotions so openly and loudly, and for a long time, I have felt it is something to be insecure about.

But now, as I’m making big decisions about the future, like how I want my final 98 days until I finish school to look, I’ve realised that these overpowering emotions are not a bad thing.

I think when I look back on high school, I probably won’t remember how many Pacific conflict essays I wrote or my legal controlling ideas, but the love and emotion that I feel within myself every time I walk into West Commons and am greeted by a smiling face, or the adrenaline of performing badly at busking, or even just the care that I feel from the people around me.

At Wenona, spirit is about support, care and the way we show up for each other. And so, if there is anything that my big feelings and sensitivity have taught me, it’s this.

I would not be the same person today without the people around me, and I hope I can give back to those who have helped me grow by showing my emotions and gratitude as loudly as they have made me feel them. Because for me, that is what spirit is.

We can choose to show the love that we feel, we can choose kindness, and we can choose to use our sensitivities to make the world a better place. It’s our choice to see the good in showing our emotion.

Around the same time last year, I made a speech in which I simply said: “I want to change the world.” Now that I reflect on this, what I said remains true, but I think what I really meant was this: if I can encourage at least one person to choose to love, to be kind, to utilise their sensitivity in a way that supports others, then that is the change I mean when I say I want to change the world. That is the spirit I want to encourage. Be proud of your emotions and don’t ever shy away from telling or showing another person how you feel, because otherwise you may never know how your emotions can change others and the world for the good.

To quote one of my little sister’s favourite actors, Ethan Hawke: “When you’re feeling, you’re alive. The sun doesn’t care if the grass appreciates its rays, it just keeps on shining.”

I am a sensitive person, and I want to change the world.

*Each week, Wenona’s student leaders share their insights with their peers in Assembly.