This is my entry for the Raise Up Project, an online hip-hop and spoken word competition aimed to put a dent in the high school drop-out crisis where at least a million students drop out each year. Find the lyrics below:

Choose to Grow

I don’t want to see you on your deathbed
Holding on to words that you haven’t even said yet
Thinking ’bout the people you have barely even met yet
With a heart built for love but always filled with that regret
‘Cause theres more to life than drowning in our sadness
And for me believing in a better future is just a necessary madness
For in my search for bliss, I’ve found ignorance is just the negligence
Of responsibility in creating a better me, where I can look back
And see how I’ve grown
New experiences
Times that I’ve flown
Beautiful memories which in my mind find a home
This is my personality, my past and my history

But here we are in this very moment
Where our future meets our past
We live in the present
Its the here and the now
A moment of choice
To move or to stay still
To laugh or to cry
To hurt or to heal
To grow or to die

A series of choices make up our life
And in life, we pay time to get closer to our human capacity
Sacrificing fleeting pleasures in the name of self mastery
It always begins when you realize it starts by saying,  “me”
That if I desire change, I can act differently
To take on this world and start to view it objectively
Find a new mindset, the right perspective can set you free

Its overwhelming, and I feel it too
The not knowing what one should do
But to be honest I’m a little bit relieved
Of the magnitude of having to choose how to be
‘Cause in high school, one teacher recommended me
To take his Intro to Computer Science class
The bait was making games, all I had to do was pass
Seven years later, I’m just a year from my bachelors degree
If it weren’t for him
I haven’t a clue where I’d be

So stay and talk with a teacher
Find them after school, I promise you they’ll be there
They spend their lives catching us up to speed
Helping us grasp the ideas we’ll definitely need
For every class, every question, every answer
All can be found with a trace of this simple desire
To share humanities knowledge that we’ve thus acquired

Education has the power to open doors of opportunity
It can help set up a better world for the next you and me
And where it fails cause its not the best system
The worst way change it is by being indifferent
To take on this task we have to work together
I can’t do this alone, I need your help to make it better

So lets all work collectively
To build a world we want to see
The world in which we live it free

So lets come together
One rhyme at a time
One message
One line
One mind together
Sharing this single message
That it can get better
But only if you put in the effort
This is what you need to remember
From January to December
Time will continue
And this is not just a resolution to renew
The same failed goals
That darkened shadow cast over broken dreams
Evidence of a heart torn at the seams
Time will continue
And you will once again be presented a choice
You can choose to grow
Choose to raise your voice
And I hope you have something powerful to say
About how instead of tomorrow,  that you chose today
To see passing moments as an allowance of time you’re prepared to pay

‘Cause why do we fight when we can also create
I’d rather enjoy your soul, than be hurt from your hate

I don’t have time to thank every teacher
But I can’t even fathom the blessing it is to be here
At school I’ve found some of the best of friends
And I find the more I learn from them
The more I learn about myself
And the struggles we face seem a bit more manageable
When theres more than just one knight sitting at the round table

Please stay another day
So you can be a part of change

This is a message from my heart
A wish for you to see your part
In this world we share
I urge you to care
To see the unknown as something to know
And in the pursuit of life, I hope you make the choice to grow