10/8/2021 A Coming of Age: From Boy to Man I believe that am searching for a group of close friends who I can use to broaden my perspectives and form my identity. After my first two days on campus, I felt miserable. I wasn’t making any friends like everyone else and I was so nervous that my stutter prohibited me from engaging in even the most basic forms of communication. I felt worthless and unworthy, and I spent that night crying in my bed. It took a few weeks, perhaps a month, to start to form relationships with others. To make that change, I had to hold myself in a high esteem. As Brené Brown asserts in her TEDX Talk, “people who have a strong sense of love and belonging believe they are worthy of love and belonging” (7:24). I had to believe in my capabilities, that I was worthy. I believe that I must discover my identity and aspire to be my ideal self, not the embodiment of others. In coming to college, I sought to use my independence as a fresh start to mold myself into the being which I strive to be. I realized that in order to succeed in this goal, I must embrace my complete self as I am, and not conceal parts of my identity from the world. As David Brooks asserts in his Ted Talk, “Adam 1 is built by building on your strengths, and Adam 2 is built by fighting your weaknesses.” Adam 2 is the virtuous and moral being, while Adam 1 is not. I must embrace my flaws such as my speech impediment and fight this weakness instead of shoving it in the closet and trying to suppress it. I believe that the simple acts of kindness and compassion can go the longest way in making the world a better place. Since coming to campus, I have learned that I am not the only one struggling in my transition to independence. I have come to find that enduring this change with others is better than enduring alone. In order to expect help from others, I should offer kindness and compassion to those who need it, such as helping a struggling friend on a math assignment, waiting for my friend to finish his meal, or even just holding the door open for someone. “Treat others how you want to be treated,” my mother always told me. In his article about faith, David Fagerberg claims that “the unexpected flashes of love in our lives illuminate reality, like a thunderbolt of lightning can illuminate the dark yard.” People in rough patch are the ones who need our kindness the most, and it is important that we recognize their needs. Since coming here, I have learned that college is not easy, and study groups and friends to rely on are essential for success. I believe that having a good friend to share your inner thoughts and feelings with is essential to my well-being. Over the past few weeks, I have developed an intimate relationship with my roommate to the point where no conversation crosses the line. Having that connection is essential for me because it prevents me from keeping my fears pent-up inside of me, which would cause me to be stressed and depressed more often. As Olivia Taylor describes in her article about relationships, “a good friend should never make you feel like the things you’re saying are unimportant and uninteresting.” Several times so far since coming to South Bend, I have had to walk away from a relationship because I knew that I couldn’t be my genuine self in front of that person, since I was always trying to prove my “popularity” in front of them. It was important for me to recognize that dynamic because things could have easily turned south if I didn’t act. I believe that my education is meaningless without understanding its purpose My whole life, I have been told the goal is to get into a good college to get a good job to make a lot of money. But is that really why I am being educated? I think not. My goal is to make the world a better place so that my children can live even better lives that I live. I am being educated so that I can help those who were not as fortunate as I am, so that they may have the same opportunities that I do. As Father Kevin Grove explains in his speech to the Notre Dame community, “faith and reason together place us in relationship to each other.” We cannot have a functioning society with functioning relationships if we are unable to understand why we learn and why we invest in the pursuit of knowledge. In my Middle Eastern Studies USEM class for example, we don’t just memorize facts about the past, we try to make sense of patterns and motives of groups and empires so that we can better understand political dynamics in our current world today. Perspectives such as these enable us to solve current issues in our society. I believe that learning from my past experiences and sharing them with others is the key to forming successful relationships and developing my character. Everybody knows we are a product of our experiences. It defines who we are, what friends we have, what we prefer, and how we act. Being transparent and open about your past lets others know that you entrust your personal knowledge to them, which strengthens both of your relationships. In her poem “Where I’m From,” George Ella Lyon shares childhood experiences and memories to describe who she is. Experiences provide lessons. Typically, we cling to experiences with negative outcomes, so they remind us not to act in the same way in the future. I am an introvert. I want to be an extrovert. But that claim would not make sense if you did not understand my experiences. I was rarely allowed to go over to friend’s houses. I developed a very unhealth video game addiction at one point in my life. It took many years for me to stop looking out the window at who I could be and start looking into the mirror at who I was. Now I am better able to self-reflect. And thus, I am happier, and more satisfied with who I am. I believe that understanding who people are and what they believe in is important to removing any implicit biases that we may have. As I have learned in my Free Speech class here at Notre Dame, hate speech arises when one ethnic or cultural group are fed stereotypes from disinformation platforms that are based on broad generalizations. This breeds discrimination and even incitement of violence because we tend to distance ourselves from those who are different from us. As opinion writer David Brooks asserts in his article “How to Destroy Truth,” “emotional and moral knowledge should give us a sense of identity, a sense of ideals to live up to and an appreciation of the values that matter most to us.” A lack of knowledge destroys truth. Thus, it is my duty to preserve truth by educating myself about others. This is made possible not just by learning in a classroom, but by interacting with those who are different from me culturally and socially so that I can learn from their experiences and avoid implicit biases that I may form. Since coming to Notre Dame, I have had the opportunity to meet so many interesting people from places ranging from my hometown to the Philippines to Brazil. Each person I meet has a story, one that defines them and makes them special. Works Cited: “The Power of Vulnerability” by Brene Brown - FYE Week One “Should You Live for Your Resume…or Your Eulogy?” by David Brooks, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlLWTeApqIM – Moreau FYE Week Two “Faith Brings Light to a Dark World” by David Fagerberg, https://grottonetwork.com/keep-the- faith/belief/faith-brings-light-to-dark-world - Moreau FYE Week Three “5 Signs You’re in a Toxic Friendship” by Olivia Taylor, https://grottonetwork.com/navigate- life/relationships/signs-of-toxic-friendships/ - Moreau FYE Week Four “Two Notre Dames: Your Holy-Cross Education” by Father Kevin Grove, https://notredame.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=859bc1a8-0d0f-4eb4- a1c1-d0a45c429187 - Moreau FYE Week Five “Where I’m From” by George Ella Lyon, http://www.georgeellalyon.com/where.html -Moureau FYE Week Six “How to Destroy Truth” by David Brooks, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/01/opinion/patriotism- misinformation.html?referringSource=articleShare – Moreau FYE Week Seven https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4Qm9cGRub0&feature=youtu.be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlLWTeApqIM https://grottonetwork.com/keep-the-faith/belief/faith-brings-light-to-dark-world https://grottonetwork.com/keep-the-faith/belief/faith-brings-light-to-dark-world https://grottonetwork.com/navigate-life/relationships/signs-of-toxic-friendships/ https://grottonetwork.com/navigate-life/relationships/signs-of-toxic-friendships/ https://notredame.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=859bc1a8-0d0f-4eb4-a1c1-d0a45c429187 https://notredame.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=859bc1a8-0d0f-4eb4-a1c1-d0a45c429187 http://www.georgeellalyon.com/where.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/01/opinion/patriotism-misinformation.html?referringSource=articleShare https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/01/opinion/patriotism-misinformation.html?referringSource=articleShare