I\u2019m very passionate when I play tennis. I\u2019ll do whatever it takes to win. But that has also caused a lot of mental strain. I can be very hard on myself \u2014 I\u2019m a perfectionist.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
My mom and my dad raised me to believe that balance is key in life: It\u2019s key to success and happiness. On the tennis court, I\u2019ve had to find the balance between wanting to win and still loving myself if I lose. My game since finding that has skyrocketed.<\/p>\n
When life gets stressful, I like to spend hours playing my guitar or ukulele. They\u2019re pieces of home that I brought with me. I\u2019m a big music person \u2014 it\u2019s an escape for me.<\/p>\n
As much as I love California, I\u2019m an adventurous person, so I wanted to go outside my comfort zone and prove that I could excel in a situation that I\u2019m not used to. I wanted to come to the tri-state area to experience the different seasons and a different culture.<\/p>\n
I was looking for a school with a good nursing program and a tennis team where I would be a starter but that had room for me to grow and push myself. That\u2019s how I ended up at TCNJ.<\/p>\n
Coming to TCNJ for the first time was quite nerve-racking. The college seemed so perfect that I didn\u2019t know what I\u2019d do if I didn\u2019t like it. But I loved it. This was my dream school.<\/p>\n
When I\u2019m missing home, I pick up my guitar and play \u201cTake Me Home, Country Roads\u201d by John Denver. It\u2019s a song my mom sang to me growing up. It reminds me to not take life too seriously and brings me back to when I was a carefree kid in California. It keeps me grounded.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m a kid at heart and I think that\u2019s the best way to look at life \u2014 through the eyes of a child. I really want to pursue pediatric oncology or pediatric emergency medicine. It\u2019s a career where I can make a difference in people\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n
Picture: Bill Cardoni<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For this tennis ace from California, balance is the name of the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":327,"featured_media":11925,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lions-roar","category-on-campus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/327"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11899"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11899\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12298,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11899\/revisions\/12298"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}