“Everyone brings into the world unique talents and abilities, and some of mine include my strong will and determination. I will continue to engage myself in school, work and sports and try to remember to enjoy the journey along the way. Somehow I have managed to get to the places that always feel right, and this is where my education has led me.”

I was in the third grade when my parents enrolled me in a two-week theater camp. They told me it was just for fun, but they were hoping it would help me be more confident about speaking publicly. It’s safe to say that it worked.

At the conclusion of the camp, there was a showcase performance, where our parents and also a few Hollywood youth agents were invited to see us perform the monologues and plays we had been working on. An agent approached my parents at the end of my performance and asked them about me, and although they laughed it off at first (we weren’t a “performing arts” sort of family), I let them know that acting was something I definitely wanted to pursue. My parents agreed to support me in that pursuit as long as I maintained my good grades in school. So we began our journey into balancing school and acting work that I am still on today.

I’ve learned that in the auditioning process for acting jobs, there is very little that you can control in terms of getting the job you are auditioning for. This is because there are many factors that have nothing to do with the audition (contracts, salary, availability, co-stars, network requirements, agency agreements, etc.) that determine who books the role. In schoolwork it is just the opposite. When I put the effort in, know the material and complete the assignments and tests to the best of my ability, I know that I will most likely get the desired result.

I could not be more grateful for the opportunity I’ve been given on a show that’s been a part of American pop culture for 65 years. I am surer than I have ever been that acting is what I want to do with my life. My work on General Hospital has taught me that I need to dig deep to get to some of the emotional places that the stories require, and I know that having a “regular” life with school, sports and non-actors has helped give my performances depth and helped them to feel real. I have an acting coach who once told me that I should “read about and learn everything you can about whatever you can, because even if you never have an acting job related to what you are learning, it will still give your acting depth.” When my character, Josslyn, struggled with her embarrassment at her schoolmates learning of her kidney transplant, I knew that I could show her emotions realistically because I know what the pressures of fitting in at school and wanting to be like everyone else feels like.

No one is exempt from turmoil in their lives, and I can honestly say I am grateful for the challenges I have had because they have strengthened my character and brought forward certain virtues I might otherwise not have known. Coming so close but ultimately not getting a few huge acting jobs that would have been life-changers has been heartbreaking for me. But everyone brings into the world unique talents and abilities, and some of mine include my strong will and determination. I will continue to engage myself in school, work and sports and try to remember to enjoy the journey along the way. Somehow I have managed to get to the places that always feel right, and this is where my education has led me.