What perseverance (and lots of parental support) looks like:

People often ask me how I got into college, med school, etc and well...this is it.

Being concertmaster of the Duke symphony, performing for the former president of Taiwan, the awards ( #humblebrag) were all nice but the value of a musical background cannot be understated...

There’s the cliche stuff:
the discipline of practice/lessons/competition/orchestra rehearsals
the time devoted to above plus traffic jams/repairs
the money spent
the tears shed
the teamwork learned thru chamber music...

There’s also the benefit gaining
a broader world view
an appreciation for all music
a perspective that I exist in a point on a timeline hundreds of years after some of these composers have died...

But watching these clips back, I realized it gave me something to be proud of then.

A little boost of confidence after every performance that yes, I did a thing.

And that reward is worth so much more than the video game cartridge I got in exchange for winning a trophy.