Writing Sample

I was recently applying for a job that required a "writing sample." The following is what I wrote. It is a little bit longer than I will normally post but I thought it turned out well and goes along with my last post so I wanted to share it.

Even though I am just finishing up my college career, I do not have any recent papers that I feel would make a good writing sample for this application requirement. Fortunately, I enjoy writing. Being able to say honestly that I enjoy the act of writing is a rather new realization to me. As a youth and even into college I have always done well on my writing assignments but I always assumed that was just because I put in the effort to write how I thought the teacher wanted the paper to be. I thought that I disliked writing, mostly because it wasn’t “cool” to like writing and I did not recognize that keeping a journal, e-mailing, and chatting online were all forms of written expression that I did enjoy and that they were helping me to develop writing skills. Of course I am not writing about this to brag that I am such a great writer, but to demonstrate that (a) life is made up of purposeful actions and (b) all human actions are the result of decision based on calculations, whether conscious or not, to make one happy. Writing and I will serve as the example.

Action is the employment of means to attain an end. As human beings it is impossible for us not to act. Even doing nothing or standing by idly is a form of action because it changes events; it attains an end. According to economist and philosopher Ludwig von Mises, by acting, man is choosing and determining his own destiny. Unlike animals, by living in a state in which man is capable of desiring a better state of affairs, can imagine a better state of affairs, and believes he can

attain a better state of affairs, his action is purposeful. In all actions his purpose is to attain that desired better state of affairs. For example, in writing papers that I supposedly did not enjoy writing you might wonder why I would put in the effort to write it. As I think about it now I realize that I wrote then because I thought that getting a good grade would make my parents proud of me, make my teachers like me, and of course eventually help me get into a good college, which I was told would someday lead to a good job, etc, all of which I believed would make me happy. If did not write the paper then my state of affair would not be satisfactory because of the poor grade and the displeasure it would cause in other people, but I knew that if I acted, if I wrote and wrote well, then my state of affairs would improve.

Admittedly, there was some level of personal satisfaction of doing well, but at the same time I still claimed to dislike writing. The grumbling and complaining to family and friends about writing papers was fairly routine. What was the purpose of the grumbling? To make my peers like me of course. I assumed that my state of affairs would not be satisfactory if I claimed to like writing because the majority of my peers claimed to dislike writing and I would therefore be an outcast. However, by claiming to dislike writing I believed that my state of affairs would improve as my peers accepted me.

The transition from claiming to dislike writing to openly acknowledging that I love to write has been slow. I believe that it developed gradually as I began writing lengthy e-mails in a long distance relationship using the written word as a form of expression for my personal beliefs and opinions. Once that person, who is now my spouse, began to commend me for my writing ability I was able to start accepting that it would not damage my state of affairs to acknowledge that it was not just effort to please others but that I am a good writer as well. Later his encouragement allowed me to acknowledge that I am not just a good writer but that I enjoy doing it too. However, that realization could not come until my belief about what would lead to a satisfactory state of affairs was changed.

It is necessary to point out that even though all of my actions were based on calculations to improve my state of affairs, or in other words, to make me happy, that does not mean that my calculations were necessarily correct. As it turns out, I may have been much happier had I acknowledged openly as a youth that I enjoyed writing, but I did not believe that that would make me happy. Unfortunately, there are many people today, especially the youth who do not realize that their calculations for happiness are incorrect. They seek happiness by doing what others tell them will make them happy instead of listening to themselves. In working for Adelante Chicas it would be my goal to help the girls in the program to look inside and find their true happiness. Life is made up of the actions that we perform everyday. All actions are based on calculations to make us happy; we just have to find the right calculation.

Von Mises, L. (1949). Human Action: A Treatise on Economics. Yale University Press.