Over the course of this term, you will be building a portfolio that captures and describes the vision you have for your life. Your portfolio is private in that it is only seen by yourself and your instructor. It is rated according to the following: How specific is it? How well does it demonstrate synthesis of ideas? How reflective is it? and How meaningful is it?
You’re now ready to create the first entry for your portfolio. You will complete a short reading and then must write two pages on the topic given in the reading.
Experience 1 My Life Vision
This is your first My Life Vision entry. Based on the reading below, write a minimum of 2 pages on the topic of “Who Am I?” Please submit your work in the google doc that is provided for you.
Who Am I?
Exploring the qualities and characteristics that make up who you are as a person is a valuable exercise. Each person has positive and negative qualities and characteristics. If you find that you have qualities that may hold you back from achieving your goals, you can make changes that will positively affect your future.
An important part of who we are is determined by the characteristics or qualities that we possess, qualities like humor, intelligence, strength, warmth, self-assurance, anxiety, shyness, etc. Many of these qualities are inherited from our parents, but some evolve out of our experiences and upbringing.
We also have both positive and negative characteristics—no one is perfect—and it is important to be aware of them both. If people focus too much on their negative characteristics and are not aware of their positive qualities, then they can begin to lose their self-esteem. Low self esteem can have negative effects, such as depression, drug and alcohol abuse, lack of motivation, poor grades in school, etc. On the other hand, if people are unaware of certain negative qualities, they may not take responsibility for the effects these negative qualities may have on others. For example, if a person is a complainer all the time, his complaining will most likely negatively affect the moods of those around him. Without the understanding that he is a constant complainer and that his complaining brings down his friends and co-workers, he will never change. In another example, if a person is extremely shy, she may not want to venture far from home, she may not want to go to college for fear of the new surroundings, she may not want to try new things, etc. She is holding herself back because of her shyness.
Therefore, knowing who you are is important. Understanding that you are a valuable, worthwhile person who possesses a great many positive characteristics is essential to your emotional well being. But working on those characteristics that may prevent you from reaching your goals and developing healthy relationships is also necessary to your future success.
You should start your My Life Vision entry for this experience by picking out some nouns or adjectives that describe your qualities or characteristics. For example, I might pick out these nouns or adjectives to describe some of my qualities: exaggerated, grumpy, funny, intuitive, worried, strong, caretaker. The adjectives or nouns should be both positive and negative. Then you will develop each of these adjectives by discussing how and why they describe you. For the adjectives or nouns that you are not so crazy about, you should write about why you think you have these qualities—what you think makes you the way that you are—and how these characteristic have affected your life up until this point. Then you will discuss how you might try to make changes in those parts of yourself.
