I am growing up in a family of two different ideologies. My dad’s family is conservative while my mother’s side is liberal. Politics didn’t have a meaning to me as a preteen, but they have been more important since politics started affecting me. 

My journey to my ideology started when I began playing sports. I want to win, so I train my hardest to beat the other players and teams. I moved away from the “everyone gets a trophy” mindset when I started to outperform my competition. I also didn’t want a trophy for when I did badly in a race. I didn’t feel entitled to a trophy because of my discipline.

I taught myself to eat healthy and workout regularly while maintaining good grades in rigorous classes. I drive myself towards maintaining peak fitness so that I can’t turn back. I have stopped caring about enjoying sugar; I can’t enjoy food if it’s too sweet. I feel bad if I don’t eat vegetables during any meal. I train everyday and my sweat and suffering has paid off. I didn’t get to be ranked in the top 20’s nationally in my age group in cycling by sitting around, playing video games and eating Doritos. Self discipline is connected to conservatism because both ideologies revolve around delayed gratification and working towards the end goal. 

Conservative beliefs are based in Christian values, which declare there is a right and wrong and that everything has a purpose. The easiest example of this pertains to casual sex. The Christan scriptures state that sex should only happen between married couples, and that its purpose is for reproduction. It promotes a strong family unit, which is shown to have beneficial effects for children. 

I went to Hebrew School every week as a child. It has taught me prayers and the meaning of God. Hebrew School wasn’t seen as an inconvenience in my life, as it has subsidence and meaning. Religion is important to me because it teaches me morals and dignity. The Scriptures have given me a sense of what’s right and wrong. Religion has taught me to be humble. God has blessed me with my athletic abilities, and I am thankful for Him. I know that there is God out there because he has given me a plan and desire. The Bible states “all men are created in God’s image.” The Bible influences conservative beliefs, as they uphold God’s authority. 

I was the youngest one to get a job among my siblings. I love being paid because I then have money to buy myself goods. This is where politics really start to come into play. Since my paycheck is taxed, I am now directly affected by who’s in office and which party is in power. As a person who wants the highest return from my work, I then took a stand against higher taxes. 

My lack of entitlement also goes into my paycheck. I am not a 15 dollar/hour worker. I am a high school student. I deserve to be paid based on the skill. A person who can fix a part in four minutes shouldn’t be paid the same as someone who will fix the same part in thirty minutes. People have different levels of ability and should be paid accordingly. 

As part of the workforce, I began developing a basic economic theory. I thought if you raised the minimum wage, other prices would also inflate. I came to this conclusion by working in a small business. The owner wants to keep the lights on; he has bills to pay. Owners of small businesses aren’t rich elitists who have disposable income. They are frugal to maximize profit. If my employer wants to maintain profit and their livelihood, a higher minimum wage will increase their retail prices if they are forced to pay their employees more. 

As a conservative, I believe in a strong military. I am enrolled in RV’s NJROTC program and plan to serve my country in the future. The military is important to me for the basic reason of defense. I want America to have the strongest military in the world, so my fellow citizens are safe. America should be feared by other nations, because it acts as a method of defense. I believe in a high budget for the military because of the ever changing technology required to keep our country safe. America needs to be on the forefront of engineering, so we are equal to or better than other nations’ equipment. I believe in a strong military because I want to win a war if it’s waged on us.

I was always a conservative, it just took me a while to realize it. Self discipline is inherently a conservative value because one only needs to rely on himself to maintain order to succeed. Being fiscally conservative stems from the idea that one should be rewarded for their work. My work ethic stems from religion humbling me. Religion has taught me that God watches over us and disciplines us for having rejected His authority. Believing in a strong military has stemmed from my American pride. Conservatism is a belief I associate with due to my personal doctrine. My conservative beliefs will lead me to a career as a professional athlete or going into the service to serve my country.