This outcome is an opportunity to rise

This morning I awoke with tear filled eyes, and as I walked to class I saw many people with the same distraught expression. I watched my classmates cry on the phone to their parents as they walked to class, I held my best friend a little tighter, and I read countless Facebook posts from my peers expressing their fear.

I, like many of you, am devastated, horrified and disappointed in the nation I once had so much hope in. As someone who sees the world as an inherently good place this was a huge reality check, but now is not the time to give up or give in. Now is the time to rise up and fight back.

We cannot change the fact that Donald Trump will sit in the Oval Office come January, but we can make sure his hateful rhetoric does not spread any further.

We can dedicate our lives to spreading love and acceptance in a nation that has made hate so prevalent.

I will not stand by and allow this election to destroy me, and I hope you won’t either. Instead we must allow this outcome to inspire us to love more fiercely, speak out more often, and condemn hateful actions with every breath.

If every person reading this becomes someone who doesn’t accept anything but acceptance from their peers we can make a change. If we speak out instead of saying silent we will create a nation of love even if the man leading us does not embody these qualities.

Many of you see this as the end, but I challenge you to view it as a new beginning, an opportunity. We have the opportunity to step into the unknown and create something amazing. All we have to do is decide to start. We have to make the effort to keep fighting even when it seems as though everything we’ve been working for has been lost, because it hasn’t. We as millennials did not do this, we did not elect Trump to the Presidency.

We are succeeding in the fight against discrimination, at least with our peers, and now all we have to do is spread our feelings to tomorrow’s children, and today’s parents. We have four years to right this wrong, and then we can elect a candidate who embodies everything we as millennials believe in: equal pay, reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, religious freedom, and immigration.

Don’t stop fighting just, because the ballots have been counted. Start fighting harder for what you believe in. Allow this moment in history to ignite a fire inside you to spread love and acceptance for people of every race, religion, gender, and sexuality.

We have two choices. We can either let this election destroy us or empower us. On November 8th when we had two choices we made the wrong one, I challenge you to not make that mistake twice.