Week 14- Capstone integration Three McEntee Capstone Integration Assignment Spring 2022 Jill McEntee Planning and Pursuing a Life Well Lived My mission in this world is to grow and change and impact other’s lives as well. I want to experience the joys and sufferings that this world has to offer. I want to explore our beautiful world. I have dreams and aspirations, and life is too short to be living someone else’s dream. Furthermore, I am truly happy when I am pushed to my limits. A life without challenges is a life without living. I believe that my greatest talents and best gifts are seen in moments of high stress and pressure. One of my goals in life is to make it known that each person in this world deserves dignity and respect. Although we should embrace our differences we must also respect our similarities. Moreover, When all is said and done the most important things in life are relationships. I realized that people and the relationships that we have with each other matter more than anything else in this world.(My Mission Statement” by Jill McEntee- Moreau FYE Week Thirteen) I would define a life well-lived as a life full of people that teach me something different every day. I want to look up 10 years from now and see that I am not in the same place as I was today. An observable sign that I lived a life well-lived is that I am not making the same mistakes at eighty that I am making at eighteen. Kiersten Dehaven’s Domer Dozen speech was very insightful and eye-opening. Kiersten’s path seems untraditional and full of passion for faith and her community. I was inspired by her dedication and commitment. In my future I would like to work with people from across the world who each contribute different amazing qualities to collaboration. Many of my dreams and aspirations are through helping others. (“Domer Dozen”, by Kiersten Dehaven - Moreau FYE Week Two) Moreover, I would also like to follow in the footsteps Professor Steve Refenberg of Another statement from the article that stood out to me was Gutierrez’ comment on not giving a voice to the voiceless, but rather providing an opportunity for people to have a voice. In a developed country such as the U.S. at times there is a sentiment of superiority towards other countries, which is horrible and wrong. However, we all must be educated from a young age that it does not matter whether we live in a prosperous nation or not, each person everywhere deserves the dignity and respect to have their own voice. No one should speak for another, everyone should have the opportunity to share their voice. (“Teaching Accompaniment: A Learning Journey Together” by Professor Steve Refenberg- Moreau FYE Week Nine) I would like this to be my mission in life. Making sure it is known that everyone has a voice, no one is voiceless. Sometimes no one is listening hard enough. Like I stated in my Integration earlier this semester, “I do not care about what I did or how I could be described, but rather how I made people feel. (Integration 3 by Jill McEntee- Moreau FYE Week Eight) Furthermore, I would like to include everyone on the journey of making sure everyone’s voices are heard. In Dr. Diangelo’s article about racism, it was very interesting to learn about issues of racism broken down into parts and with a “white” perspective. Dr. Diangelo also made it very clear that racism is still embedded in our lives. Out of every point that Dr. Diangelo made one that really stood out to me https://domerdozen.nd.edu/ https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hZbSdVImfn2hZDqMrdL96dZCNOtHuf6C-lg3sH-Rs30/edit https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hZbSdVImfn2hZDqMrdL96dZCNOtHuf6C-lg3sH-Rs30/edit Capstone Integration Assignment Spring 2022 was a discussion of our own racism, and the racism of other white people. The answer to this issue was education. As a white person in American society, as I have progressed through school I have learned more and more about my own prejudice. I am taking away the importance of education and action from this article.(“Why It’s so hard to Talk to White People About Racism” by Robin DiAngelo- Moreau FYE Week Ten). Thinking more about racism in our society will set me up to further my mission of making it clear that everyone in our society deserves dignity and respect. Moreover, at nineteen one of my own qualities that I have learned over the course of my life is that I live each day excited to talk to people with all different perspectives. I know that every day I can learn from new people and experiences. However, my friend Ella told me that I can be spontaneous and adventurous. Overall, I really enjoyed this opportunity to talk to Ella (Conversation with my friend Ella Moreau FYE Week Five). Moreover, as the career center stated, “The only way to know more about yourself is to test the waters - just get out and experience life! “This quotation resonates with me because I find myself constantly preoccupied with the thought of a perfect future or a five year plan. Without trying new things I would not be soaking up every opportunity that the world has to give. Something that also stood out to me was the paragraph speaking about doing a job that you love. In my life I would like to choose a job that I love that does not feel like work every day. (“Navigating your Career Journey” by Career Center- Moreau FYE Week Four). Ultimately, In “A Grotto Story,” Dr. Lim was truly an inspiration. I can not imagine how his accident impacted his life and turned it upside down. It was inspirational to learn about the progress that Dr. Lim had made. He referred to many of the negative conversations that he had within himself towards his life and dreams .He also discussed how he complained a lot during this time because it felt like his world was over. However he realized over time that he had many gifts and a life under God worth living. Thus. In the Grotto video it was very clear that Mr. Lim had begun to appreciate not just the little details of life, but his relationship with God. More specifically, the five minutes every day that he must recline his chair he used to pray and establish a strong relationship with God. (“A Grotto Story” by Mr. Lim - Moreau FYE Week Six). Mr. Lim’s story and his attitude towards his life and proven to me to never lose faith in God along the journey of my life. Similarly, I would like to slow down in my life. The lyer article demonstrated to me how to put away an hour of time to do nothing, I am going to try to put away 5 minutes each day away from the stimulation of my phone and computer. (“Why We Need to Slow Down our Lives” by Pico Lyer- Moreau FYE Week One). In my life I would like to slow down and take time for the people around me. In my life my focus is not on the success or achievements, it is on the relationships we make and the paths that they take to create these relationships. This part of the integration is the hardest part for me to grasp: acceptance that life will end. Sister Aletheia wrote, “My life is going to end, and I have a limited amount of time. “We naturally tend to think of our lives as kind of continuing and continuing.” This quote resonated with me because I think death is a fear that we all have. We spend so much time thinking about the future when in reality we https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bdVnfLDrJUJhd-4UtYb_kfRpcFgOoOeY7O1WT8_d3iw/edit https://undergradcareers.nd.edu/navigating-your-career-journey---moreau/ https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/transform/why-does-god-allow-suffering/ https://ideas.ted.com/why-we-need-a-secular-sabbath/ Capstone Integration Assignment Spring 2022 don’t know what that future looks like.e. We all act like life is continuing and continuing and continuing when in reality that is not the perspective we should have. My mission in life is to hold on to a perspective that life could end tomorrow or way in the future. This fact should not change how we look at the world. (“Meet the Nun who wants you to remember that you will die” “by Sister Aletheia - Moreau FYE Week Three). In my life, I would like to focus less about a 10 year plan and more like a 10 day plan. Life is constantly changing which is why you have to be ready for the different tides. Instead of acting like I have an infinite amount of time to live out my dreams, I want to make them possible tomorrow. Ultimately, all that matters in my life are relationships. Pope Francis’ Ted Talks talk about the importance of our relationships, I believe that is at the core of my dreams and aspirations. (“Why the only future Worth Building includes everyone” by Pope Francis - Moreau FYE Week Seven) In the end I would like to be remembered by how I made people feel. In my lifetime I would have liked to have impacted 10 lives for the better.“In surrounding ourselves with people who agree with us we’re losing our sense of how someone may disagree with us” Moreover, I think this quote articulates something that many of us struggle to understand and talk about. In our own minds we very frequently find ourselves in bubbles with people who think similar thoughts to us, when in reality we need to be careful about entering an echo chamber. It is very easy to find ourselves trapped “ in a feedback loop” with people who think the exact same way as ourselves. However, if we constantly are surrounded by people who support the thoughts that we think and never disagree we are not learning anything. I find this to be true with my political beliefs as a political science major. Frequently I find myself looking towards one news source versus another, when in reality I should be looking towards many different scholars perspectives. (“How to Avoid an Echo Chamber” by Dr. Paul Blaschko” - Moreau FYE Week Eleven) “Yes, I am alive, and George Floyd is dead. I can breathe; he cannot. But just because a police officer did not murder me or my children does not mean that he did not harm us.” The quote from Dean Cole, the Dean from Notre Dame law school resonates with me deeply. I am unable to fathom the experience, pain and suffering that Dean Cole and his family faced when he was a child or even after the tragic deaths of many African American women and men in this country. For me, the pain and suffering is tragic and needs to change immediately, however I do not live in fear that I am going to be the next target of racial violence and hatred. Moreover, Dean Cole is completely right when he states that he can breathe. We all can breathe right now and we have the opportunity to make changes in the world because we are at Notre Dame. Each day that we breathe we have the opportunity to, as the cliché states, “make the world a better place” (“I am George Floyd Except, I can breathe. And I can do something”- Moreau FYE Week Twelve).A world with less hatred, exclusion, discrimination and vioelnce is a world that I would like to create and be a part of. Overall my mission is pursuing a life-well lived is to experience life to the fullest, learn from many of my mistakes, but also leave positive impacts wherever I go. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/memento-mori-nun.html https://www.ted.com/talks/his_holiness_pope_francis_why_the_only_future_worth_building_includes_everyone/transcript https://www.ted.com/talks/his_holiness_pope_francis_why_the_only_future_worth_building_includes_everyone/transcript https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaIVxQcqnLs&t=1s https://law.nd.edu/news-events/news/dean-g-marcus-cole-i-am-george-floyd-except-i-can-breathe-and-i-can-do-something/