Tag Archives: reflection

Being Your Own Cheerleader

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“Cool means being able to hang with yourself. All you have to ask yourself is ‘Is there anybody I`m afraid of? Is there anybody who if I walked into a room and saw, I’d get nervous?’ If not, then you’re cool.” — Prince

With nearly less than three weeks before graduation, it has become more surreal that I will soon be leaving Scripps. After finishing my senior recital last weekend, I had a moment of static happiness and joy for something that I had put so much time and effort into. What my audience may not have known about was the callouses on my left fingers, the self-doubt of walking on staging and crashing despite the 2-5 hours I spent practicing daily, the inner reflections that emerged out of isolation in a practice room. But through this preparation, reframing the self-undermining uncertainty into positive self-talk, I have been able to become more comfortable with myself and confident in working on areas of personal growth.

Senior year has taught me a very important lesson in being my own cheerleader, striving to relentlessly love myself through hard times and celebrate myself after completing amazing (big or small) feats. My support network has been nothing but compassionate, caring, and always there when I called upon them. At the end of the day, all the advice, guidance, mentoring, suggestions, and affirmations that I was told by others, could only do so much. All these words, while important and I am immensely blessed for, would only push me to take initiative if I believed them fully and truly, telling them to myself as well. I have always been a huge self-critic. This semester, my inner cheerleader has really had its challenges, through numerous job rejections, unanswered phone calls and emails, feeling isolated from people I love the most simply because we are not in the same situations.

As I prepare to move across the country, I have been reflecting about this transitional period, this crossroads of my life. I am lucky to have arranged an apartment, two temporary and part-time jobs, and a support system in DC. But this has all been an immensely circuitous process, for many reasons out of my control, despite having done all I could do in the proper moment and time. Never have I ever felt so much hard work without any payback or relief of it all “being worth it.” One of the most difficult things has been to talk to my inner critic by also being my biggest cheerleader, especially when I needed to withhold my feelings inside myself for fear of them not being received fully by another person. To anyone who is in limbo about a summer internship, post-graduate opportunity, or simply feeling the flux and vitality of a changing environment during this busy time; You are not alone, your thoughts and feelings are valid, and you are strong.

Congratulations, seniors, on turning in thesis and rounding the final lap of our college careers. The future isn’t just bright, it’s blinding, and I hope whatever the next steps are, you are wildly excited, celebrating yourself, and being your own cheerleader.

 

Big Fish, Bigger Pond

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As September rounds off to an end (congrats, everyone!), I’ve finally gotten into the full swing of my routine. I’ve rediscovered the study spaces where I feel the elusive productivity-Zen balance and I’ve relearned how to juggle numerous roles each day, every day.

Being a senior exponentially increases the occurrences in which I realize just how amazing it is to be at Scripps. Living my last year of college has made me continuously  visualize and grasp just how many resources and opportunities we have access to here. (On a more superficial note, seriously, how much would a membership to a gym the quality of the Field House cost?). Thinking about the future has made me reflect upon the recent past. A lot new experiences and firsts have happened since my first year at Scripps. How can I draw upon these past experiences of newness in order to prepare to new future settings? How will I transition after leaving Scripps, becoming a small fish in a big pond again?

The last time I was a small fish in a big pond was during my internship this past summer at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. (Side note, they recently announced Kendrick Lamar will be performing with the National Symphony Orchestra! I’m very jealous that that didn’t happen while I was there…). This was my first structured 9 to 5 job, commuting across downtown with the rest of the daily grind, clutching my coffee for dear life, and still managing to look somewhat presentable after 45-minutes of the DC metro and walks to and from stations through thick humidity. My most “typical intern” moment happened on the first day when I tried to walk past the security guard just to find the bathroom only to get very much called out. Definitely a small fish move.

I could have been anywhere, any a new city, new job experience, new living situation (leases and rents are stressful). I was once again a small fish in a small pond.

Planning new chapters of life is scary, but I find it helpful to remind myself that I am setting a plan for success. There is no guarantee for success, but if there’s no plan, well then that’s definitely not a guarantee for success. New experiences accumulate and become frameworks of how we handle change. I’ve been able to say to myself “I’ve done this before.” The newness is novel, but not always unfamiliar. I’ve grown to handle the newness with confidence and flexibility.  Any new beginning illustrates our ability to learn, adapt, and adjust; your first college class, your first senior thesis colloquium, your first on-campus job or summer internship, your first application for a post-grad opportunity, your first time abroad. It is a matter of point of view, retrospective as well as forward facing. If I let apprehension or worry about what might go wrong prevent me from planning or trying, I may have never have those journeys of what it is like to become a big fish swimming towards an even bigger pond.

First-Year Balance and Beyond

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As my first year of college comes to an end (a brutal end at that; finals sure are grounding), I reflect on all that has happened this past year, all that I have learned and become, and all that is now familiar to me, and I look forward to what comes next.

I feel like a first year of college is not something easily forgotten. It’s among the most eye-opening, stimulating, overwhelmingly terrifying-yet-wonderful times of life. The opportunities are endless in the community of driven, bright, unique, and passionate people. College is where intellectuals flock to exchange everything from music to ideas to book recommendations to social commentary in an environment unlike any that existed before and any that could ever be replicated again. Recalling my first year navigating through this incredibly stimulating environment reminds me of the single afternoon I spent alone at the Met in New York last summer—there were too many wonderful collections and beautiful pieces of art to see, too many people I wanted to share my experiences with, and too little time to do it all. Yet, despite being astounded by the sheer volume and quality of what was offered throughout the exhibits, I managed to weave my way through the halls, spending time with what piqued my interest the most and admiring all that I could.

A first year of college offers so much that begs to be experienced. Knowledge is everywhere, begging to be delved into. Yet, we cannot choose everything.

As I begin to consider how I want to color my sophomore year, I am trying to balance what I love, what I am interested in, what I find to be fun, what I want to learn about, and what it I feel compelled to do. This means trying different things than I did this past year, but also building on what I have done to continue to give back and learn in this community in enriching ways. I cannot get involved in everything. I decided I want to take five classes next year, but that means I had to cut some other co-curricular activities. I am taking on positions with more responsibility in some of my out-of-class involvements, which means my schedule will end up being more locked down than this year. Despite the give and take and the loss and gain, I am looking forward to a new batch of endless opportunities.

The most important thing I have learned this year is simply just to go do. Do what makes you happy, what helps you grow, what might be intimidating at first, but always what you think may help you develop into the kind of person you want to be, in every respect. There’s no reason not to try what interests you at least once, you never know what may catch your fancy!