For Blog post IV, I thought we would take a small detour. In our first class together I challenged each of you to make the most of your final year here at St. Saviour. We are a month and a half in and I thought this TED talk would help serve to help remind us of what it takes to be successful. You want to be successful right? The video we watched in class was provocative and informative. For this post do one of the following:
- Pick one the eight qualities you believe you possess and discuss how it has helped you
- Or consider one quality you lack and how you intend on improving it
- Or describe someone who is inspiring to you and what about them are you drawn to
My friend, Star, was born with cerebral palsy. Growing up, she was met with much mockery and ridicule for her disability. She was raised in a foster home, and at the age of 12, she was adopted. Two years later, her adoptive mother died. Shortly after, she learned that she is only expected to live to the age of 45.
ReplyDeleteThat’s a lot to take on at such a young age. Therapy and prayer helped her overcome the obstacles she faced, and she has said that she’s, ”made a dedicated commitment to keep striving for independence by following her dreams even when negativity keeps trying to become [her] partner.”
Star made a documentary in 2013 about her life, and has been motivating others ever since. At an after-school program I attended, she was my peer mentor. She always tried so earnestly to give me and other students the same wonderful experience she had when she was in our place. It moved me to know that she came to work everyday, tireless and devoted when others could have easily given up.
Star has plans of becoming of a public speaker and writing a book. I think she would make a great guest speaker at one of our upcoming liturgies.
Check out her documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qsti3GyZFs
That's an amazing story. Thank you for sharing.
DeleteOne of the eight qualities I believe I possess is focus.
ReplyDeleteAs high school students, we are forced to balance many different areas of our life: school work, home life, our friends, extracurricular activities, etc. We have no choice but to learn how to use our time and energy in an effective way. We must also determine what our priorities are. Life can seem very hectic, and even chaotic, but with the right amount of focus, we can be successful.
Focus is such a valuable quality to have because it allows us to sift through all the extra "stuff" in our lives and get to what is really important, or what is really near and dear to our hearts. For example, when looking to find a suitable college, most teenagers are exposed to a huge array of possibilities. College A might offer a fantastic biology major, but College B might have an awesome exchange program, while College C may be in a beautiful part of the city....These are all very alluring, but we have to focus in order to make a good choice. What is it that we truly want out of life? That's a question we must all ask ourselves in order to make decisions we will not regret.
I think focus has allowed me to balance many different things on my plate. Without focus, I wouldn't have known how to use my time or how to make good choices. It is the quality that has most helped me during my time in school.
Focus is a tough one to have in today's world of infinite distraction. Keep your eyes on the prize and you will arrive there before you know it.
DeleteOne of the eight qualities I believe I possess is focus. With all of the assignments I receive every day it is hard to stay on topic. It is easy to get distracted by Netflix or Instagram.
ReplyDeleteI am also on two sports at the moment and they are both very time consuming. Being able to come home from an exhausting practice and be able to focus on my assignments. Then there is the common app always hanging over my head.
I manage to stay on top of all of my responsibilities by keeping everything organized. Balance is the key to my focus.
A quality that I must say I lack is patience. In a society where everything is presented to us within milliseconds it is easy for us to become completely impatient with the way things are if they are even a second or two slower than normal. I am included in this as well, however it is my greatest hope that I can soon learn to have patience as many other people. However I was told that more often than not that patience comes with age, hopefully I'll learn to become more patience
ReplyDeleteOne of the qualities that I lack is determination. Coming back from Basic Training I thought that I'd have more determination, but that didn't happen as I'd hope. At Basic Training, one of the qualities that you really need is determination because you really have to push yourself through training.
ReplyDeleteMany times I felt like I wanted to quit with things like ruck marches or when we'd get smoked. I had to really keep in mind that everything that I was doing was for a greater cause so it was worth the pain.
Coming back to the civilian world after 10 weeks, I kind of lost my determination because I know that I can relax after constant training. One of the things that really ruins my determination is also my really bad tendency to procrastinate. I tend to put things off and it ruins my drive to get things done.
One quality I lack is patience. But, I have been improving on this in the last two years. Growing up, everyone in my family was impatient, and they still are. The smallest mistake on my homework causing an argument and a wrong turn on a vacation causing it to be cancelled. Growing up I was always the patient one in the family. But compared to others, I'm very impatient.
ReplyDeleteNow that I've been working at Congregation Beth Elohim since last year, my patience has improved. You would THINK you need more patience dealing with 6 year olds (who I had last year) but my current 8 year olds (3rd grade) can be a horror. But I have been learning to be very patient with them instead of sending them to the office (which I used to do quite frequently). Sometimes just having a chat with them will make them listen. But having a chat with an 8 year old also takes a lot of patience. But, i'm trying to improve.
i meant to say: "But compared to other, I'm not very patient"
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOne of the eight qualities that I believe I possess is: push.
ReplyDeleteAs a student in highschool, pushing yourself is important. You are always piled up with homework, tests, and/ or quizzes. And then like whipped cream on top of a horrible sundae, college decisions, applications, and essays top it off. Then some people have jobs and/or after school clubs/sports that take up their time. They now have less time to do their work and study, in turn leaving less time for relaxation. So we start to feel extremely exhausted and feel that everything basically sucks, so why should we even try and continue on. We start to have a negative outlook on everything and thus tend to give up or at least want to give up more easily.
I know what this overwhelming feeling of drowning in schoolwork feels like. Juggling two AP classes, a college level math course, 3 clubs after school, and the thought of “Oh God! I still don’t have my college essays done.”, I spend hours just laying in my bed worrying about all the things that I have to do and hating my life. And some days, I just feel like i don’t want to do anything anymore. I don’t want to get up at 5 in the morning to go to school. I don’t want to go to class and force myself to stay awake. I don’t to stay after school for hours and rush home to finish my homework and study. I’m tired! All I want is one day where I can just sleep and do nothing. This is where my quality of pushing myself comes up.
I know that if I give up now, nothing good will come from it. No one can give up. Giving up now means basically giving up your future. I push myself with the thought that if I keep going, I’ll get into a great college which will then lead me to a great career and future life. I will know that all of my hard work wasn’t in vain. So i push and push knowing that I have pushed myself before and made it through, so now I only have a couple of laps left until the finish line. And then the thoughts of my mother working so hard to pay for my great education flashes in my mind. Giving up now would throw all of her hard earned money down the drain. And the thoughts that my family is cheering me on and waiting for me to make myself and them proud, also help me push myself even further. No matter how much I don’t want to, every morning, I still find that strength to push myself out of bed and up these dreadful stairs with the mindset that I will get through this and finish everything that needs to be completed.
One of the eight qualities I believe I lack is determination. When it comes to doing activities that I enjoy or want to take part in, I am very observant and willing to participate. Anything that I find the slightest bit dull on the other hand, I struggle with.
ReplyDeleteEver since grammar school, I have always had this mentality that if something is boring, don't do it. Being a senior going into college, I am realizing that this "disease" I have, will not help me in any way with accomplishing my goals in life. I am trying very hard to fight this urge but I feel that as long as I have faith and strength, I can demolish this bad habit.
I'm a Taurus and one of the many qualities a Taurus posseses is persistance but many would rather call it being hard headed. Words like quit, give up, stop or end are not in my vocabulary when it comes to the things that are very important to me.
ReplyDeleteI have been through too much in my life to give it all up to obstacles that stand in the shadows of the things much greater than they are that take over my past. I always tell myself "Smile in the face of failure, Smile in the face of fear." or when something I have to do presents me with only two choices I tell myself "Go big or go home".
Life really is too short for the big things I have in mind. No matter how many times I fall, I have to get up. There is no use in crying over spilled milk because there are people out there working much harder than I am to provide that very milk that I put to use in my daily life. Nothing is ever in vain as long as your are willing to go that extra mile even if it feels like everything around you is falling apart.
My dad works every single day. Sometimes he gets sunday's off if he's lucky. I only see him in the mornings because by the time I go to sleep, he comes home. He's every hard working and provides so much for my brothers and myself. I could say that he is very succesful because he owns two companys and he just recieved a check, which makes a million dollars he made this year. Even though I take him for granted, I have to rememebr that he's working hard every day to give us a good education.
ReplyDeleteOne of things that I'm drawn to my dad is hard work, focus and determination. He helps me to work hard and focus in school. As a teenager, there're many distractions and fun activities that Icould get myself in but as long as I focus on my work, I'll be fine. He also taught me how to be determined. Sometimes school makes me want to give up, but the determination helps me to stay focus and never give up. These are the reasons why my dad is inspiring to me.