Integration 1 Hannon Prof. Nguyen Moreau FYE 15 October 2021 Building up my Core (Beliefs) I believe that 2+2=4. I believe that I am currently in South Bend, IN. I believe that the wait time for stir fry at the dining hall will always be longer than it says. But when it comes to more fundamental beliefs, I tend to shy away from strong beliefs. Root beliefs seem scary because they imply action: I can’t just say that I have a belief; I actually need to live it out. With that being said, I have deepened four core beliefs regarding service, friendship, faith, and stories in these past two months. I believe that my purpose is to help other people. I’ve enjoyed volunteering since I was little, and for four years I participated in my high school’s weeklong summer service camp. Fortunately, my top five virtues—judgement, perspective, prudence, teamwork, and creativity (VIA Character Strengths Survey - Moreau FYE Week 2)—seem like a good recipe for making a difference in others’ lives. One of my hopes for college is to find more ways to help people in more unique ways. For this reason, I joined Enable, a club which designs and 3D prints prosthetic hands and arms for users around the country. I’ve been fascinated for years with a wide variety of medical differences, including limb differences, but I would always inadvertently fall into pitying such individuals and making assumptions that they were completely reliant on prostheses: “So that is how to create a single story, show a people as one thing, as only one thing, over and over again, and that is what they become” (“The Danger of a Single Story” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Moreau FYE Week 7). Through Enable, I’ve been reminded that https://canvas.nd.edu/courses/25086/modules/items/109283 https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_ngozi_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story/transcript?language=en limb-different individuals do not deserve pity; prostheses are useful tools for them but not anything monumentally life-changing. This has made me modify my belief somewhat: my purpose may be to help people, but being helpful doesn’t mean I have to do everything. Furthermore, I believe that I can forge life-giving relationships by being myself. During the first few weeks of the semester, I was thrust into this community where I knew almost no one and I was desperate to make friends after struggling throughout high school to find a stable friend group. I knew that I should just be myself, but even so, I put on this facade of being overly outgoing, cheerful, and agreeable. Thus, my belief was challenged even by my own actions: without consciously realizing it, I would modify my personality with each person I met to try to imitate them in the hope that they would be friends with me. I wasn’t the whole me, which made those first weeks stressful and reminiscent of Brown’s wisdom: “Shame is really easily understood as the fear of disconnection: Is there something about me that, if other people know it or see it, that I won’t be worthy of connection?” (“The Power of Vulnerability” by Brené Brown - Moreau FYE Week 1). Even so, I often worry too much that I am a toxic friend. I worry that I talk about myself too much, that I initiate too much, that “[I] can only hang out when it’s convenient for [me]” (“5 Signs You’re in a Toxic Friendship” by Olivia Taylor - Moreau FYE Week 4). I hope that if I am truly and authentically myself, those toxic pitfalls will avoid themselves, and I have finally found two friends with whom I can make sarcastic jokes, spend hours hanging out on the weekends, and talk about stupid things, all without fear of judgement. Moreover, I believe that I am searching for faith. After reflection on where I’m from, I’ve realized that my 15 years of Catholic education and going to Mass regularly since I was a newborn have put me into somewhat of a Catholic bubble (“Where I’m From” by George Ella Lyon - Moreau FYE Week 6). Faith came easy as a child, especially since I was so surrounded https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4Qm9cGRub0 https://grottonetwork.com/navigate-life/relationships/signs-of-toxic-friendships/ http://www.georgeellalyon.com/where.html by religion, and, for better or for worse, I was a little sheltered from the outside world. As I’ve gotten older, faith has felt increasingly foreign, inconsistent, and impersonal to me. Here at Notre Dame, I’ve met both some of the most devout Catholics and some of the most staunch atheists, and I’ve struggled to find where my faith fits in the continuum. I oscillate between seeing the beautiful virtues of faith and the ways in which religion can be harmful. I am part of a Compass group with students who seem more serious and confident about their faith than I am, and that makes me feel even more conflicted. I desire faith, but I don’t want it to be forced, and I think this advice will help me going forward: “Be patient. If you’re in a hurry, faith becomes so much harder to understand” (“The Role of Faith in Our Story” by Fr. Pete McCormick - Moreau FYE Week 3). I want to have faith not because I was raised this way, but because I have genuine convictions. Finally, I believe that I pursue truth by listening to individuals’ stories. I have interacted with people who differ from myself in terms of major, political leaning, race, socioeconomic background, sexual orientation, and much more. While Notre Dame is by no means the most diverse college campus, I have still learned so much. For the first few weeks of class, I would eat my meals with different people each time, and I loved hearing all about their backgrounds, likes, dislikes, and why they ended up here at Notre Dame. I’ve heard from a guy who turned down Ivy League offers for a full ride here in spite of his hesitancy regarding Notre Dame’s Catholic identity. I’ve heard from a girl in the Gateway program who had already put an enrollment deposit at another college before deciding during a senior retreat to take the offer here instead. I’ve read about Fr. Sorin, who came here in the dead of winter with nothing but a promise: “Notre Dame du Lac has been given to us by the Bishop only on condition that we build here a college” (“Letter to Father General Moreau” by Fr. Sorin - Moreau FYE Week 5). I believe that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcZMeqWWOIs https://drive.google.com/file/d/1o56woQDq3QrRkziT8eYrvYly5CQaP2Vb/view each of these unique stories collectively represents truth. Each story is like an unrepeatable puzzle piece that has its own spot in the full image of the truth of life. The more stories I hear, the more of this truth I will discover. I hope that I will become more confident and mature in my root beliefs over the next four years. If all goes according to plan, I hope to be helpful yet unbiased with my patients in some career in the medical field. I hope to deepen my relationships and form new ones, all while being myself. I hope to continue on my faith journey and find some more answers. I hope to hear stories from as many people around the world as possible to construct the puzzle of truth. But no matter what, there is one current belief that I hope will be disproven: I hope that the stir fry line times will one day be accurate.