STRENGTH - TRUST - GROWTH
“The main focus is myself and the goals that I want to achieve, not the expectations from others”. 
       After Fall break, I felt like I have been recharged, since I had one week to get away from work, stress from exams, and everyone, truly focus on myself, and living at a slower pace. I realized that as I move into college life, personal growth is one of my top priorities. I particularly like the quote from “Why letting go of Expectations is a freeing habit” by Julia Hogan, LCPC - Moreau FYE Week 9, “ “You can’t live your life according to the expectations of others. When you do, you aren’t living your own life — you’re living someone else’s life.” This quote is like a reminder to me that sometimes meeting other people’s expectations is needed in order to create a good reputation for myself, yet it is completely fine to not follow them. People can always make mistakes, even something as perfect as a machine can malfunction sometimes. It is important to know how to select expectations that are achievable and make me feel comfortable achieving them, or else, just like the quote says I would live the life of others. Normally I would describe myself as someone who is very calm and always thinks positively, but at certain moments, I also have self-doubts. One example of this is during the college application process, when I knew that I got accepted into Notre Dame, I was very excited yet at the same time asking myself how did I get into here, did I deserve that opportunity to get in, what if I perform poorly, then I would disappoint my parents. One of the most important things that help me overcome this anxiety is realizing that everyone is on the same boat, and after I have an open conversation about this with my roommate, I felt a lot better since I could get everything out of my chest and share it with someone who is trustworthy. In addition, I would also describe myself as somewhat a perfectionist. I used to set very high goals for myself without realizing that I am treating myself too strictly. This is not very healthy since if I could not achieve my goal I would consider myself as a failure. Over time, I learned a valuable lesson that it is better to set achievable goals than setting big goals and feel pressured to achieve them. That mindset helps me a lot whenever I am facing tough situations like huge exams at school. It also helps me to focus on myself more and gain self confidence. In my perspective, it is okay to let go of other’s expectations, but at the same time self-expectation should always be kept since people should work with a certain goal in mind. 
   “It is completely normal to have brokenness, how I get over with them is more important.”
        From the video “Women find healing through Kintsugi workshop” from Grotto Network - Moreau FYE Week 10, I understand that no matter how good I can hide away my emotions, there will always be a moment when I find myself at a very low point. It is ordinary for people and me to experience different emotions at various times. I believe that even though brokenness can give me negative feelings which may take a long time to forget about, yet I should view it with positivity as thinking negatively for a long time is detrimental to both my physical and mental health. I find the video from this module very intersting as people use art to face pain and brokenness. Breaking an object like a mug or a plate is like directly facing people’s pain, since it is not easy to destroy an object all of a sudden. After that, people in the workshop connect all of the broken pieces together, as if they are trying to overcome their pains or looking at it with a more positive energy. The action of people trying to break the objects is like releasing all of their sadness, disappointments out of their chest, and when they remake the object, their pain will go away since they have transformed them into something different. The broken pieces no longer carry that sadness. It truly depends on different people and how they perceive pain when it comes to how easy it is to get over brokenness. To me, whenever I have any sadness, I always try to look at the positive side of it, and slowly work from there,and overtime, my pain would go away. Sometimes it is not easy to keep that happy attitude, and in that case I believe that time can heal my pain. After discovering about Kintsugi, I would do some more research on this and may attend a workshop on this someday. For instance, one brokenness that I face in Notre Dame is when I did not do well in my Accounting exams despite how much effort I have put in to study for them. The results were not so great, but I tried to calm myself down by looking at what I did well and them slowly figure out which areas that I need to improve on. 
“I understand that sometimes I have to cope with the situation when I have a conflct with someone rather than avoid it”. 
     Extracting a quote from “Thirteen ways of looking at community” by Parker J. Palmer- Moreau FYE Week 11: “The concept of community must embrace even those we perceive as “enemy.””. As I become more mature, since I have more experience interacting with people from all walks of life, I realize that not everyone has good personalities, and not everyone is willing to treat me nicely. There is no reason to be let down by those people since I know that I am treating people fairly, and there is always someone out there who always supports me. In addition, I am part of a community, which means that I should support and offer help to others no matter how much I do not like them. My “enemy” would never disappear from my community, so the way to face this is to live along with them, and remain a distance towards them. The community in Notre Dame is not an exception. Not everyone is kind and warm-hearted. I do have my own conflicts with several people, yet I choose not to avoid them since there is no point doing so, we exist in the same community, so it is not like we would never see each other again. The best way to face this situation is to move forward and act neutral towards them, and I know for a fact that I can always be friends with other people. 
                         “I should not loose hope even when I am in tough situations”
     “It remains only for us to find how even the cross can be borne as a gift.” - “Holy Cross and Christian Education” from Campus Ministry at the University of Notre Dame - Moreau FYE Week 12. In my opinion, this quote implies that people should try to keep on thinking about positive things whenever they are going through difficult times in order to overcome them easier. From the text “Hope- Holy Cross and Christian Education”, during its foundation, the Congregation faced many hardships. However, Father Moreau always encouraged the community to see the hand of Divine Providence, believing that the Lord’s choicest blessings come through the crosses we bear out of love for him and love for others. He has hope in the Lord's choices, and that is what brings people out of tough times. It is very important to maintain hope in our lives, since hope is a part of what we believe in. People may exist in the same community, but they pursue different beliefs. I particularly find pursuing Hope is very important especially whenever I’m in a bad situation. Having hopes helps me get out of those situations and have something to look forward to over the next day. Having hope also helps me to figure out what I truly want and set goals for myself to achieve easier. In a way, having hope links my past and present to the future. I have a vision for what I hope will happen. Whether it does not, just envisioning it can make me feel better. Every time I have a bad day from college, I always say to myself that tomorrow is going to be a better day, and just in a few more months, I can come back home and reunite with my family. 
      In these past few weeks, I have a chance to understand about myself deeper, exploring different sides of me in a much deeper angle. Up until now, I still learn new things everyday, and I am grateful to take part in this course.