What have I learned about myself recently? Well, surprisingly enough, I’ve learned that I actually truly enjoy physical activities like exercise and yoga. This was quite the revelation to me because I’ve typically been self-conscious about exercising and always felt silly whenever I tried. Now, however, I’ve come to appreciate how I am able to focus on whatever physical activity I’m doing and can clear my mind of everything else. More importantly, I like how my body feels strong. I don’t mean strong as in super swole bodybuilder-type, but strong as in I feel more confident just existing in my body.
Me after going to the gym for a year. Jokes.
Also, I’ve learned I need to make creative activities a dedicated part of my life as well. I used to think that appreciating art and such was just a hobby for me, but now I’m coming to realize how it’s much more than that. I look at these activities as ways of reasoning and making sense of my experiences/world, and need to incorporate them into my life accordingly. I find a lot of meaning in being able to, for example, paint when I have the time, and I want to make writing a part of my daily routine as well. I guess writing more frequently, and more in-depth, is one of my goals!
Other goals that I have are to develop that “growth mindset” that we talked about in the presentation, and to be better at connecting what I’m doing daily to my more long-term goals. To be honest, this is the second time I’ve seen the growth/grit/stick presentation, but I think I got more out of it this time than I did when I first saw it as a freshman. Back then, I had no clue what college was going to be like so everything Joe said kinda just floated over my head. Now that I’ve had those failures he talks about in the presentation, I’m able to appreciate the content on a new level. Like I was telling some of the other fellows today, I think college has really reduced my level of grit and my perseverance unfortunately! Everytime I fail, I just feel beaten down and have a hard time sustaining motivation. It’s just hard when you don’t have a cheerleader constantly telling you “YOU’RE AMAZING YOU CAN WORK HARD AND ACHIEVE!!!!” when you’re in the thick of it during the school year, so I have to definitely put time into solidifying my own worth for myself and finding personal reasons to stay dedicated.
One challenge I think I have experienced is finding a balance between my school life and my home life. More so than a lot of my peers that I know, I’m pretty invested in my family life throughout the school year and it is important for me to go home often and help out where I can. However, I find that whenever I do go home, it’s like my school life doesn’t exist anymore and I literally turn off all thoughts of schoolwork. What ends up happening is that my whole entire weekend is shot and I end up staying up till godforsaken hours on Sunday night trying to catch up on all the studying I should have done on say, Saturday morning. This year, I strive to maintain that same involvement with my family, but do so in a way where I can merge my schoolwork with my home life. That means probably waking up earlier on Saturday and actually studying huh.
In terms of mistakes I’ve made, not to be pessimistic or anything, but sometimes I feel like most of my college experience has been mistakes with the very occasional moment of success. That’s probably way over-the-top but….Anyway, I think my biggest mistake in college is how I just accept defeat even at the very beginning of a class when I know it’s going to be challenging. Going into a lot of science classes, I’m usually like, “Well I know this is gonna be hell but let’s try to not fail completely,” instead of going in there aiming for an A. Like I said, college has sucked the life out of me. But guess what! 2018 is the Year of the Growth Mindset! We’re making power moves and changing our lives for the better ONLY.
The mood for 2018 and the rest of my life after I get that Growth Mindset™! Even though I’m my own biggest hater….
To end this long-winded semi-rant about my life, I will end with the one quality I have that I think has contributed/will contribute to my success. Contrary to how dreary some of what I wrote sounded, no matter my failures, I actually try to stay hopeful. I’m excited every time a new semester starts because I see it as a blank slate and I always think maybe this semester I’ll change my ways. So far, I haven’t but hey, there’s always next semester right?