12-1-2021 Learning Inside & Outside the Classroom It is crazy that I am close to the end of my first semester of college. Two weeks from now I will be done with all my finals and the next day I will be back at home. Some of the time during the semester, it is important to appreciate this craziness. A few years before Senior year of High School I did not really think of college or even if I will have the chance/money to get into college. I am part of a low-income family so I had doubts on my future, and these doubts dwindled closer to my senior year. I had hope because of others that were in my same shoes, but in higher grade levels, were getting scholarships within my high school. How does this connect with my development so far in the semester? This craziness is the result of being able to get to a place you did not expect to get to. This craziness was only possible because you got to this place only because of reasons you should not take for granted. I am doing this integration for a good grade, but focusing only on school can hinder the strength you had to get to where you are today. Additionally, this strength came from others that are back at home and that are not a commonality anymore. “To assume I could instantly meet my New Best Friends while also getting used to a new place, starting a new academic career, and learning how to adjust to life away from home — that’s a full plate already” (“Advice from a Formerly Lonely College Student” by Emery Bergmann - Moreau FYE Week Nine). It is stressful to experience this change, but try to know that your family and friends are rooting for you back at home. Let them be your push forward. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/09/well/family/advice-from-a-formerly-lonely-college-student.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/09/well/family/advice-from-a-formerly-lonely-college-student.html “I want people to also know that their hearts are breakable, and it’s a very good thing, that it’s worth celebrating because it allows you to grow and expand” (“Women Find Healing Through Kintsugi Workshop” by Grotto - Moreau FYE Week Ten). The Grotto states this to take away despair from people that have no hope. Sometimes it is good to accept your flaws so you can handle your flaws. Looking at your flaws you can see where you are now and how these flaws helped you to develop into something greater. The sentence after the quote helps to address this hope in a quite simple and obvious way, but still in a powerful way, as well. “And you get to put your heart back together” (“Women Find Healing Through Kintsugi Workshop” by Grotto - Moreau FYE Week Ten). You still have to work to put yourself together. You must put in effort so you can feel better about yourself and need to develop a way of thinking that inspires hope. This hope allows you to start putting your heart back together. In my case, I would not say I need to put my heart back together, but rather my happiness back together. When trying to fix my time management, it became hard to stop procrastinating and to do my work on time. By procrastinating, I was more stressed and sadder. My coping mechanism for this was to realize that tomorrow I will not feel this way when the work is done. When I do not procrastinate, it shows that I learned from my mistakes and I try procrastinate less because I know it will lead to stress. I then know that I can fix my happiness through effort. At Notre Dame I feel a little out of place, and I was expecting this when I was here. However, I realized early on that I did not have to be out of place since there are a lot of nice people here. I https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/heal/find-healing-through-kintsugi-art/ https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/heal/find-healing-through-kintsugi-art/ https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/heal/find-healing-through-kintsugi-art/ https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/heal/find-healing-through-kintsugi-art/ feel welcomed and was greatly pleased with the community here, even as I experience a jump from the three percent of my high school that were white to the sixty-something percent at this school. As it is still a little awkward, it is important to know that “intimacy is neither possible nor necessary” for all the people I meet (“Thirteen Ways of Looking at Community” by Parker J. Palmer - Moreau FYE Week Eleven). This does not involve crossing races either, it is for all the people that are here. In a way, it would be awkward in any community to be close friends with everyone you meet. Lots of communities are not small, so having too many strong relationships is excessive. This can be the same if you feel that some people do not match your interests and would not be the right friends with you. With what I said, it is still important to realize “a capacity for connectedness is both possible and necessary if we are to inhabit the larger, and truer, community of our lives” (“Thirteen Ways of Looking at Community” by Parker J. Palmer - Moreau FYE Week Eleven). The quote tries to highlight that respect is still important. Disputes and hate are not the way to go. All this insight came about because of my experience this semester. What I was taught did not come from classes alone, but also from this insight that will allow me to feel more comfortable with individuals and to see the unknown is not too bad. Another thing I experienced is a change in learning process. There are so many experiences that are different compared to when I was back home which required me to be more independent. It was strange to do laundry on my own, to buy train tickets in combination with plain tickets, to plan out this trip in the first place, to organize times to eat, to organize social events along with homework, etc. There was so much to do on my own. There were so many things I did for the http://couragerenewal.org/parker/writings/13-ways-of-looking-at-community/ http://couragerenewal.org/parker/writings/13-ways-of-looking-at-community/ http://couragerenewal.org/parker/writings/13-ways-of-looking-at-community/ first time or I needed to do on my own way more often to balance school with my social life and my personal life. The trouble I have comes from having no experience. I had to get over the little experience I had with these tasks so I could start learning more and more. “The contemplation of new ideas and needs beyond our comfort zones requires a sacrificial willingness to put at risk everything that we think we already know” (“Hope - Holy Cross and Christian Education” by Fr. James B. King - Moreau FYE Week Twelve). This quote goes beyond to explain this. The tasks that I had to do on my own requires me to try to understand what I am doing first. Afterward, I must force myself to start and may not be able to use prior experience deal with these things. I learned that this was necessary to succeed in such a complex world that will change around me as I have come from high school to college, will go from first semester to second semester, to sophmore year, to the end of college, then into something I am currently not ready for. I am still developing and can see that from this paper that I have learned a lot from this semester a lone. So, I am ready to not be ready, but will be ready to learn. https://campusministry.nd.edu/assets/105621/