I can honestly say that I did not expect to learn so much about myself when I got to college. I have always had pretty good study habits and great time management skills so I felt like my classes wouldn't be very challenging. For the most part that has held true, but I have also had to buckle down and study more this semester than I did during my entire high school experience. Knowing that there are many resources available to me as a Hixson scholar and being informed about them during seminar has also been very beneficial in my opinion. I also love all the people I met through Hixson. Yellow Lightning!
One of the things I was worried about when I got here was making friends-don't ask me why because I have never had trouble with meeting new people....but anyway, that was not an issue AT ALL! The girls on my floor are fantastic and I know I will be in touch with them for the rest of my life.
Overall, I think I have become much more self-reliant and self-confident this semester. I know what I want to do and I know how to buckle down and do the work to get there! I'm thankful for the Hixson seminar because I do feel like it helped me adjust a little and it's great to get to know people who are similar to me!
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Monday, November 14, 2011
What the Hixson Award Means to Me
The Christina Hixson Opportunity Award has literally meant everything to me. Since my parents' divorce, money has been really tight in my family. My mom struggles to make ends meet for my sister and I without any support from our father. Without this scholarship covering half of my tuition I have no idea how I would have paid for college. I can now rest assured that half of my tuition is covered for my college career.
I read some of you guys' posts about how you felt when you opened the letter. I actually didn't open mine myself. I was away from home and my sister opened it for me. When she said I had received the award I don't have words to describe the emotions I felt. A HUGE weight had just been lifted off my family's shoulders and given me the oopportunity of a lifetime.
The Hixson award meant that I could attend ISU, the college I have known I wanted to come to since elementary school. It also means that there are fantastic resources available to me here on campus including the Hixson study lab, mentors, and connections with people who have stories like mine.
I truly believe that we are the most fortunate people on campus and I am forever grateful for this award!
I read some of you guys' posts about how you felt when you opened the letter. I actually didn't open mine myself. I was away from home and my sister opened it for me. When she said I had received the award I don't have words to describe the emotions I felt. A HUGE weight had just been lifted off my family's shoulders and given me the oopportunity of a lifetime.
The Hixson award meant that I could attend ISU, the college I have known I wanted to come to since elementary school. It also means that there are fantastic resources available to me here on campus including the Hixson study lab, mentors, and connections with people who have stories like mine.
I truly believe that we are the most fortunate people on campus and I am forever grateful for this award!
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Social Media Weeek
During social media week I learned a lot about how social networks can set me up for my career and help me network with professionals while I'm in college. This will make it easier for me to meet my career goals. I chose to follow businesses on facebook for social media week and I think it helped me understand how much of a 24/7 job any media career is. These businesses had posts ALL THE TIME! It was a convenient project for me however, and I have to admit I found it pretty interesting. I love watching the news so having news stories from my area of the state as well as other news sites around Ames and nation-wide was really useful.
I thought the articles on social media week were very interesting. The amount of ways that social sites can be used amazes me. I was fascinated by the article that talked about how social networking sites are being used to promote public safety in Mexico. To me, that's one of the wonderful (and beneficial) uses of these sites that their creators could never have foreseen. I learned a lot from the article about using twitter to promote yourself to potential clients. It made me want to go look at my own facebook page and think about what an employer might think of what they see there. Just FYI, I'm pretty sure I would be fine!
Overall, I enjoyed the social media week a lot more than I thought I would when it started. It was really nice to be able to incorporate my course work into my daily routine. Plus, now that I think about it, I could even incorporate these same techniques in my career as a journalist. (Good thing I enjoyed it, huh?) I have a new appreciation for what sites like twitter and facebook can do to help (or harm) my career!
I thought the articles on social media week were very interesting. The amount of ways that social sites can be used amazes me. I was fascinated by the article that talked about how social networking sites are being used to promote public safety in Mexico. To me, that's one of the wonderful (and beneficial) uses of these sites that their creators could never have foreseen. I learned a lot from the article about using twitter to promote yourself to potential clients. It made me want to go look at my own facebook page and think about what an employer might think of what they see there. Just FYI, I'm pretty sure I would be fine!
Overall, I enjoyed the social media week a lot more than I thought I would when it started. It was really nice to be able to incorporate my course work into my daily routine. Plus, now that I think about it, I could even incorporate these same techniques in my career as a journalist. (Good thing I enjoyed it, huh?) I have a new appreciation for what sites like twitter and facebook can do to help (or harm) my career!
Saturday, October 8, 2011
My MBTI
I can honestly say that I am surprised by how well the Meyers-Briggs test described my personality. I have taken some other personality tests in the past but none of them have described me as well as this one does in my opinion. My results indicated that I am a "realistic adapter". I do my best work when I am free to act on impulses. I am highly aware of the needs of others and I like practical, firsthand experiences to learn.
These results relate very well to my bucket list. I said during my speech how it was kind of difficult for me to make a bucket list because I like to live in the moment and it's hard for me to look very far down the road. This relates to my assessment in that I like to be free to act on impulses. Also, my major and intended career path in broadcast journalism is a job where I will obviously have to work with many different people. It's nice to know that I am a people person and my personality type enables me to work well with others. My MBTI results have helped me to better understand what my goals actually mean and why those specific things are important to me.
These results relate very well to my bucket list. I said during my speech how it was kind of difficult for me to make a bucket list because I like to live in the moment and it's hard for me to look very far down the road. This relates to my assessment in that I like to be free to act on impulses. Also, my major and intended career path in broadcast journalism is a job where I will obviously have to work with many different people. It's nice to know that I am a people person and my personality type enables me to work well with others. My MBTI results have helped me to better understand what my goals actually mean and why those specific things are important to me.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Diversity!
Last Wednesday night I attended "The Mystical Arts of Tibet" lecture at the Memorial Union. Most of the speech was about the Buddhist practice of constructing a sand mandala and what this practice meant to the religion. I knew that mandalas were very intricate works, but I never knew that there was so much symbolism and religious meaning behind them.
I actually enjoyed the speech a lot more than I thought I would. Honestly, I thought that I would sit there bored the whole time, but the monks were pretty interesting. They described their practices and the reasons these practices are significant. Every action holds a lot of meaning for Buddhist monks. One negative about the lecture was that the monks were pretty difficult to understand because of the language barrier. However, after a few minutes I was used to the accent and I could understand the monks better. I thought that the chant/prayer the monks did before the speech itself was the most interesting part of the whole experience. I have never seen anything like that before!
I actually enjoyed the speech a lot more than I thought I would. Honestly, I thought that I would sit there bored the whole time, but the monks were pretty interesting. They described their practices and the reasons these practices are significant. Every action holds a lot of meaning for Buddhist monks. One negative about the lecture was that the monks were pretty difficult to understand because of the language barrier. However, after a few minutes I was used to the accent and I could understand the monks better. I thought that the chant/prayer the monks did before the speech itself was the most interesting part of the whole experience. I have never seen anything like that before!
Saturday, September 17, 2011
My Bucket List
I guess this assignment is a little weird for me to think about. I mean, I've always set goals for myself and I have never failed to meet them. I have always thought of my life up to this point in terms of things I needed to do, not always things I wanted to do. Being in college means I can start to think of what I want my life to mean and the things that are most important to me for the future. Now is as good a time as any to look down the road and decide where I want my life to end up.
My number one short term goal here at Iowa State is adjusting well to college and doing well in my classes. Obviously, those two things really go hand in hand. I know that this first semester is really important and it will have a big impact on how the rest of my college career goes. Four years from now, I want to graduate with a degree in a field that will be my passion. I want to know that the work I will be doing to the rest of my life will make me happy and be fulfilling.
After college I really want to be able to find a place to settle down and start my career. I hope that I will be able to find someone that I want to spend the rest of my life and raise a family with. I know it might sound corny to some of you (literally), but I really want to raise a family here in Iowa. I don't think there's anything better for a kid than small town values.
Even though I want to settle down in Iowa, I still want to have a chance to travel and see parts of the world. I want to travel to Europe, especially in Great Britain and France. I would love to travel somewhere exotic although I really have to idea where. Something about trekking through the jungle or climbing to a remote mountain top is really appealing to me. I also want to visit each of the fifty states in my lifetime. I want to go bungee jumping or sky diving, too!
Most of all, I want to be able to look back on my life, not only at the end, but also throughout, and be able to say that I have lived without regrets. I know that I will experience plenty of tough times in my life, but those times only make the good times more sweet. I want to feel like my life impacted someone else and that my existence in this world was worth something. I hope that I will be able to look at my accomplishments and find satisfaction in the path my life has taken. Considering I am already looking forward to my future, I think there's a pretty good chance that will happen!
My number one short term goal here at Iowa State is adjusting well to college and doing well in my classes. Obviously, those two things really go hand in hand. I know that this first semester is really important and it will have a big impact on how the rest of my college career goes. Four years from now, I want to graduate with a degree in a field that will be my passion. I want to know that the work I will be doing to the rest of my life will make me happy and be fulfilling.
After college I really want to be able to find a place to settle down and start my career. I hope that I will be able to find someone that I want to spend the rest of my life and raise a family with. I know it might sound corny to some of you (literally), but I really want to raise a family here in Iowa. I don't think there's anything better for a kid than small town values.
Even though I want to settle down in Iowa, I still want to have a chance to travel and see parts of the world. I want to travel to Europe, especially in Great Britain and France. I would love to travel somewhere exotic although I really have to idea where. Something about trekking through the jungle or climbing to a remote mountain top is really appealing to me. I also want to visit each of the fifty states in my lifetime. I want to go bungee jumping or sky diving, too!
Most of all, I want to be able to look back on my life, not only at the end, but also throughout, and be able to say that I have lived without regrets. I know that I will experience plenty of tough times in my life, but those times only make the good times more sweet. I want to feel like my life impacted someone else and that my existence in this world was worth something. I hope that I will be able to look at my accomplishments and find satisfaction in the path my life has taken. Considering I am already looking forward to my future, I think there's a pretty good chance that will happen!
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
At my best...
We all have moments in our lives that really define who we are and what we believe in. For me, that began with learning that my parents were divorcing. For a long time I had convinced myself that everything was okay in my family and I literally refused to see the truth. My father was a hero in my eyes as a child and he was the center of my world. But as I became a teenager he slowly succumbed to alcoholism and became steadily verbally abusive.
So right about now I bet you're wondering how this could possibly be related to the best of anything. Here's my explanation. Since my dad was so important to me, accepting the fact that he is now a completely different person than the one I had idealized my whole life was pretty difficult. It seemed like the whole world was going to think that I was destined for failure because of him. It didnt' matter how many awards I won. It didn't matter that I had a perfect GPA. It didn't matter that I had supportive friends. I felt completely alone.
As time passed by, however, I began to realize that we all control our own destiny. The support of my family, friends, and even the community proved to me that I was my own person and my father's decisions and actions didn't reflect on my life. We all say that what others think doesn't influence our actions, but very few of us can actually claim that is true. I can honestly say that I am one of those few people. The moment when I realized that for the first time was the single best moment of my life. It was a freeing experience that I can't really put into words. For me, it meant that the darkness and depression that I had surrounded myself with was lifted and my future was restored to me, and now it could be whatever I wanted it to be!
I know that college will present many difficulties for me, but I also recognize that I have many perspectives on life that others do not. I know that I am a very resilient person because I have dealt with hardship first hand. I know that I alone control my future and I recognize that I have the ability to go far in life. I hope you all know that this applies to your lives as well! You can do whatever you want to with your life regardless of what others think or say--you alone control your future so make it what YOU want it to be! Trust me, it's a very fulfiilling experience!
So right about now I bet you're wondering how this could possibly be related to the best of anything. Here's my explanation. Since my dad was so important to me, accepting the fact that he is now a completely different person than the one I had idealized my whole life was pretty difficult. It seemed like the whole world was going to think that I was destined for failure because of him. It didnt' matter how many awards I won. It didn't matter that I had a perfect GPA. It didn't matter that I had supportive friends. I felt completely alone.
As time passed by, however, I began to realize that we all control our own destiny. The support of my family, friends, and even the community proved to me that I was my own person and my father's decisions and actions didn't reflect on my life. We all say that what others think doesn't influence our actions, but very few of us can actually claim that is true. I can honestly say that I am one of those few people. The moment when I realized that for the first time was the single best moment of my life. It was a freeing experience that I can't really put into words. For me, it meant that the darkness and depression that I had surrounded myself with was lifted and my future was restored to me, and now it could be whatever I wanted it to be!
I know that college will present many difficulties for me, but I also recognize that I have many perspectives on life that others do not. I know that I am a very resilient person because I have dealt with hardship first hand. I know that I alone control my future and I recognize that I have the ability to go far in life. I hope you all know that this applies to your lives as well! You can do whatever you want to with your life regardless of what others think or say--you alone control your future so make it what YOU want it to be! Trust me, it's a very fulfiilling experience!
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