Full Name: Blythe Hutchison

What school do you attend?

Grace Christian Acdemy

Tell us about yourself.

I enjoy performing. I have been taking private dance lessons since I was three years old, and I have performed in a yearly dance recital. I have just started taking voice lessons and my teacher has a performance every year that I will audition for. I perform in all my school's performances that they offer. I believe that God is calling me to be a light for Him on the stage, so I am trying to do my best to build up as many skills as I can before I enter the world of the performing arts.

What is your greatest strength, and why?

I am very good at staying true to who I am. In high school, it is very easy to want to be like everybody else and less like yourself. I definitely struggled with this, but as I grew closer to Christ, He allowed me to realize that He created me to be different than everyone else. I would much rather be who God made me to be than who the world changes me to be.

What is your greatest weakness, and why?

My greatest weakness is that I lack motivation. There are so many things that I want to accomplish, and I will begin to work hard to achieve my goals, but it is very easy for me to leave those goals half-finished, no matter how badly I want the goal to be met.

What skills do you need to learn to turn your greatest weakness into your greatest strength?

I need to remember that the finished product will be worth the effort and patience that I put into it. The more I think about how beneficial the outcome will be, the harder I will want to work on the goal. I will be able to grow more by going through something hard and finishing the task rather than leaving the project unfinished.

What is the biggest challenge you have overcome, and what did you learn from that?

My family and I are currently in the process of switching churches. We have been feeling God call us to try a different church for a while, so we started looking for churches to try out. We had been members at my other church for nine years, so it was very hard to leave everything that we knew at that church, and start over somewhere else. We are trying out a church and my family is really liking it, but it is especially difficult for me because I am in high school. All the people in the youth group have already established strong friendships, and have a lot of history together. It is hard, for me, to be the new person in a situation like this. But, I believe that God wants us to go to this new church, and I am not going to get in the way of His perfect plan. I know God is using this challenging situation in my life to teach me something, so I am going to try my best to make friends, and learn from the sermons that the church preaches. If it is where God wants us, He will help me adapt and I will become a better version of myself because of this new and difficult situation.

Why do you deserve this award?

I believe that I deserve this award because I will not use this trip as a fun vacation, but as a learning experience. I will apply this experience to my future career. It will help me gain an understanding of what the people on Broadway expect. This experience will help me set appropriate goals so that I can successfully achieve my dream and help others see the light of Jesus in the way God intends me to.

Who has been a role model for you, and why?

My mother has been a inspiration to me. She works very hard, every day, to care for my family. She has a huge heart and cares so much about other people. She provides my brother and I numerous opportunities to embrace who God made us to be. She is a life coach, which means that she spends her time getting to know other people and helping them. God has made her into a beautiful light. I can clearly see Jesus's love shining through her. Though God is putting me on a very different path than the one He put my mother on, I would give anything to have a heart as big as my mother's and I strive to have a close relationship with God, just like she does.

What is the biggest mistake you made, and what have you learned from that mistake?

In the past, I have had a very small amount of patience for my brother. It would not take very much for me to be angry with him. I wanted him to be perfect, but he was not, and still is not perfect. I had to realize that I am not perfect either, and that no matter how much he can aggravate me, he is still my brother, and I need to show him grace. I am very happy that I am becoming more patient with him because I have grown very close with him. He seems more like a friend now and less like an annoying little brother.

What activities are you involved in?

I take private dance lessons and private voice lessons. I take the musical theater class at my school. I perform in all of my school's performances. I am on the dance team at my school that I helped start this past year. My school has chapel every week and I am in a group of people that lead worship on those chapel days. During the summer, I led a girls bible study and have tried to become a mentor to them.

How are you giving back to others?

I try to be a mentor to little girls. I try to tell them things that I wish I had understood when I was their age. It can be very hard to be a girl. I am an organ donor. I also found a little boy in Guatemala that my family is sponsoring. We are helping him go to school, and helping his family build a house.

Tell us about a personal achievement that makes you proud, and what you learned from that achievement?

This summer, I attended a music camp at Carson Newman University. I was there to improve my vocal abilities. When I registered for the camp, it said that at the end of the week, we would put on a performance. On the first day, the vocal instructor told us that he would have each of us perform two solos during the performance. I had never sung in front of a group of people by myself before, so, naturally, I was terrified. In fact, I was so terrified, that I called my parents that night and asked them to pick me up early so that I would not have to perform my solos. Even though they wanted to, my parents did not come pick me up because they knew that I would learn a valuable lesson from that experience. I made it through the week, and I performed my solos, and I enjoyed every minute of it. My self confidence grew and I discovered that I capable of much more than what I gave myself credit for. This was the week that I realized that I could truly accomplish my dream of performing on stage for a living. If I did not have this experience, I would be a very different person today.

How do you define being a humble person?

A humble person is someone who knows what they are capable of, but does not boast about it. Because they are aware of what they can and can not do, they are not afraid to ask for help. They have a quiet confidence, but not a prideful one. A humble person is thankful for what they have. They care more about others than themselves, but do not let other people manipulate them.

How do you define servant leadership?

Jesus is the ultimate example of a servant leader. He taught others how to love each other and how to be righteous, holy, and godly people. Though He led others, He also washed His own followers feet, and humbled himself to them, even though they were not worthy of it. But most of all, He loved us, the unlovable. He loved us so much that he died for us on the cross. A servant leader is someone who strives to be like Jesus through love. To be a servant leader, one must learn to love the unlovable.

Is there anything else we should know about you?

I love to play the piano and the violin. I have taken four years of piano lessons and three years of violin lessons. I can do multiple types of dance. I can do tap, jazz, ballet, musical theater, contemporary, hip hop, and I can dance on pointe.