Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

I spread out a giant broadsheet newspaper on the living-room floor. I was seven, and on a mission. That morning, my Year 3 teacher had given us a Show-and-Tell assignment to find one interesting article. Crawling over the vast sheets to reach the first line of a story, I squinted in concentration at the near-translucent pages. Like most young girls, I was at the peak of my fixation with small furry animals — I skimmed through full-page features on the stock market and Parliament, looking for anything remotely cute and cuddly. Eventually I settled on a story about the Tasmanian devil facial tumour epidemic; an unconventional choice that terrified but intrigued my classmates.

Every evening after, the black ink smudged my fingers as I skimmed the end...