Capstone Integration
Matthew Daly
Moreau FYE
29 April 2022
How do I Pursue a Life Well Lived?
	When I first entered Carroll Hall, my dorm at Notre Dame, I was a little intimidated by all the new people and the fact that my life would instantly change. I now had a new home, and a community around me which I would have to find a place in. Being one of the smallest dorms on campus, living at Carroll gave me a unique opportunity to really get to know all the residents, from the Rector to my fellow first years. From the basketball games to the many traditions of the dorm, became good friends with many different people, and felt like I was part of a community. Of course there still are moments of conflict, which come from any large group of people living so closely, but for the most part everyone got along very well. This was my first time living for an extended time with non-relatives, and although I have only been a student for a few months, I feel as though I have truly become part of a community. College may only be a few years, but this experience has taught me the importance of community.
	The second half of Moreau First Year Experience brought a number of different ideas ranging through all sorts of topics to my mind. Among them are the ways we should view and interpret our community, find healing over the stresses and traumas of our pasts, and view the Christian faith. I began this class as a new freshman on campus, and though this is still my first year I have grown a lot along the way, and found out more of what it means to be at Notre Dame. As such, a lot of the documents analyzed for this class had particular importance to me. With them I have altered my way of thinking for what I believe is better.
	 A philosopher who first introduced him to this concept explained how recent advances have diminished the ability of someone to find a safe haven from the stresses of the world (“Why We Need to Slow Down Our Lives” by Pico Iyer - Moreau FYE Week One). Technology, which has intruded into everyone’s life, now puts a functionally infinite amount of information within our reach and has greatly increased our connectedness with each other. As such, more than ever we need to figure out how to filter through this information to live in tranquility. 
As humans, our intelligence has brought us the ability to build rockets, create art, and establish vast civilizations. Yet it is no secret that intelligence has also made many of us unhappy. Our desire to find solutions and patterns in everything we come across has led us to dead ends on larger questions such as the meaning to life and how the universe came to be - questions which very likely may never be answered. Moreover, technology has served to add serious distractions and stresses to our lives that simply did not exist in the past. One Moreau document looked at how recent technical advances have diminished the ability of someone to find a “safe haven from the stresses of the world and a secular sabbath to combat complication” (“Why We Need to Slow Down Our Lives” by Pico Iyer - Moreau FYE Week One). What is most important to people is the desire to find a purpose. It is clear that many people indeed are struggling to find happiness because of the lack of clarity in our lives. Taking time to meditate each day in a sort of secular sabbath is a practice I will use to help find happiness.
At Notre Dame I learned about Mary Kate Battle, a nominee for the Domer Dozen (a university alumni award) who used her engineering degree to “teach children in the Congo how program, so that they could advance their country and economy” (“Domer Dozen Nominees” by ND Alumni Association - Moreau FYE Week Two). Her work in parts of Uganda and Jordan allowed her to continue on her mission to spread technical knowledge in the third world. These kind of people are extremely inspiring to me, and I hope to use my Computer Science degree after graduation to teach technical skills in developing countries. I believe that charity is the most important part of a life well lived, and believe that remembering one’s mortality will help them stay on track to achieve it. An article by New York Times writer Ruth Graham detailed how a convent Nun was “trying to remind people of their mortality in order for them to better plan their lives to be meaningful and spiritual” (“Meet the Nun Who Wants You to Remember You Will Die”, by Ruth Graham - Moreau FYE Week 3). Even non-catholics should understand the validity of this Nun’s mission, as avoiding the idea of death is simply cheating one out of accomplishing their dreams.
A big part of Moreau this semester was the concept of career discernment. As college students, the relevancy of our future careers is obvious - there only will be a few years until we enter the workforce, and our decisions now play a major role in determining where we will end up. The first part of understanding where we would fit best in the workforce is understanding ourselves, so our whole class was tasked with asking a peer about our own selves (“Week Five Discernment Conversation Activity” by ND Moreau - Moreau FYE Week 5). Another's perspective is often more telling than one’s own, and during this activity I learned about two traits I never considered myself of having: being innovative and adventurous. With this valuable perspective, I will begin to determine where I want to go from here, and will use a decision making process not unlike that brought up by the Notre Dame first year educators. They believe that when making an important life decision one should look at a problem from every angle, and balance the benefits and detriments (“Navigating Your Career Journey” by ND Moreau - Moreau FYE Week 4). This helps one to come up with an unbiased answer, and is especially helpful for hard and binding decisions.
JD Kim, a young man with dreams of becoming a chef and to explore the world was “ left paralized after a snowboarding accident” (“5 Minutes” by Grotto - Moreau FYE Week 6). Despite this terrible misfortune, and the period of depression that followed, he eventually found a new path to living a good life. This event is a real reminder that our dreams can be washed away in the blink of an eye, and that hardship is inevitable. What is important is one’s resolve to constantly strive to better themselves. When I read the excerpt from Jurisdiction I got a look into the economic struggles of a latino community in LA and how “street violence stemmed from feelings of anger and vulnerability” (“Jurisdiction” by Gregory Boyle, Moreau FYE Week 7). The truth is people everywhere have their own struggles and sometimes need help from others. The work the priest did in this story to help the community reminded me of the idea of accompaniment brought up in a memoir of an ND graduate’s work in poor areas of Chile. “To truly help I needed to learn to accompany”, (“Teaching Accompaniment” by Steve Reifenberg, Moreau FYE Week 9). He saw that the children growing up in Chile needed positive role models and a space to be themselves, but underestimated how difficult providing this support would be. After years of work Reifenberg came to realize that accompaniment, not mentorship, was the key to helping others. This meant learning from each other's experiences and working together to create change. I hope to incorporate this kind of relationship throughout my time at Notre Dame and beyond.
A big issue in today's society is race. Many of the groups I am a part of - Catholicism, American Society - fail to be completely inclusive to all people. As Robin DiAngelo wrote, white Americans tend to believe that “If we are against racism and unaware of committing racist acts, we can’t be racist…”  (“Why it's so hard to talk to white people about race” by Robin DiAngelo, Moreau FYE Week 10). In truth, however, we must seek to understand race and acknowledge how it could have impacted one’s background up to that point to be anti-racist. I will try to work towards fulfilling this role in all groups I am a part of. This is supported by a video we later watched, on the harm of political bubbles in our real life and online lives. According to the speaker, "one is encouraged to add friends who share similar beliefs, and this puts people in a bubble" (“How to Avoid an Echo Chamber” by Paul Blashko, Moreau FYE Week 11). Too often we avoid information that goes against our own preconceptions, especially when it comes to difficult issues. “it is urgent that we recognize that human rights are under threat all around the world, including here in the United States.” (“I am George Floyd. Except I can Breath, and I can do Something.” by Dean G. Marcus Cole, Norway FYE Week 12). Although it is easy for us to look into the errors of the past, like slavery, segregation, and the George Floyd incident, we need to remember that even today there are big issues that are still going to play out. 
Overall there is a lot of work I still need to do before I can accomplish my mission, and that is why I am glad I got to write a mission statement. After reviewing the Notre Dame mission, I (“University of Notre Dame Mission Statement”, Notre Dame, Week 13). I took some of their statements, such as the need to follow one’s faith and stay true to their values, and added a few of my own. Writing down a mission statement is an act that really helps cement what one wants to accomplish, and I would recommend it to all.