Balance

I think give and take is a key aspect of balance. I will say upfront that at this point in my life I am giving a lot and taking relatively little.

People that succeed in having a "good" work/life balance may look at things from a day to day perspective, like blocking out twenty minutes or an hour a day for personal time. The day to day perspective isn't applicable to everyone. For example, take college students (the ones that spend more time at the computer lab an they do their own apartments), or new parents - there isn't really enough consistency

My personal strategy has been to take the down time when I can, because I don't know how long it will be until my next breather. I think there are some aspects of childhood that per-program an expectation of that daily "me" time (nap time, recess, Rugrats at 8:00 every school night before bed). And as a result, I was disappointed when I didn't have some free time  every day. But sometimes, that simply isn't possible.

I have tried to change my frame of reference and look at the bigger picture. It's tougher to get disappointed when I expect some "me" time every week or every month instead of every day. I like to have Friday and Saturday nights to do whatever, and then begin the cycle of late nights in the lab on Sunday.

I've talked about this a fair amount with people who have "been there and done that", and I've received advice to zoom out even more - take the perspective that college is for planting the seeds, and once I get a job that college has prepared me for, I can begin eating the fruits of my labor; I shouldn't expect any "me" time in college.

Admittedly, that was difficult to wrap my head around. There is too much entitlement ingrained in me to be able to fully adopt that point of view - though sometimes it feels like I have.

I wrote all this and I just realized that I do take some time to myself during the week; I spend it at the gym. It's not everyday, and sometimes it gets derailed by other obligations, so that's where it helps to adjust my expectations. I always liked the expression, "Take it one day at a time", but I think my approach is a direct contradiction to that. Nevertheless, I'm holding out for the day when I can, as the Eagles said, take it easy.

Cultural Understanding

Part I:  the retreat

The theme of the retreat, though not explicitly stated, was clearly evidenced by the continued reinforcement of a particular concept. That concept was, however you wish to state it, the importance of cooperation.

With regard to bringing what we learned back to real life, the most significant application in my own opinion comes in achieving objectives. In the "see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil" game (game reads better than exercise to me), each person on the team was vital to the team's overall function, and the team as a whole performed according to how effectively each person contributed their piece.

See, speak, hear was interesting in that each person's responsibility was to one other person; except between rounds, there was no room for a someone to decided they wanted to try and run the themselves. This structure was also beneficical because it didn't allow for time to be wasted on voting on titles and delegating power, which is something new groups often struggle with.

The trust game, on the other hand, was open for those wonderful possibilities. There was structure in that the person with the head was the one who called out directions; otherwise, it had the air of a classic team building excercise, with such questions to be answered as:  Who is going to step up first and organize everyone? Who is going to have a good idea to contribute? Whose idea are we going to go with? Who was going to jump in first and get the gears turning?

As for the balloon game, I undersand it conceptually, but I question it's motivations. The balloon game's message was that being cutthroat is not always the best approach - sometimes success is more readily attainable through working together. If the motivations are for creating positive relationships with a strong moral compass, that's cool. But if you go into the big bad world thinking that this is the norm and people are always looking to help you, that naivety is likely to leave you disappointed. Look at it from a revenue point of view; if you are the only company in an industry, you don't have to split the revenues of that industry with anyone - customers have to shop with you. The existence of another company is someone stealing the money that you deserve. I'm sure it is more fun being a monopolist. 

You could delve further into each game if you wanted. The see, speak, hear game can be seen as a commentary on several things - people applying their strengths and need to put people where they will be most effective,  the importance of experience and the development that comes with it, making the best of a less-than-ideal situation (a person is not well-suited for a certain role) and working through difficulty to help the team succeed. The trust game was a more literal application of individual strengths.

For the big picture, this is my most poignant takeaway:  achievements through teamwork are often easier, faster, done at a higher level, or even simply possible when compared to attempting the same achievements solo. But on the other hand, teams are just people who steal your glory, right?


Part II:  (in progress)

Adaptability

There have been plenty of instances when I've been presented with an opportunity or a scenario that doesn't exactly light my fire as much as I would hope. I like to think that I do a pretty good job of acting in a responsible manner in these situations, although this doesn't say anything about my personal feelings or attitudes. There have definitely been occasions where "begrudgingly" might be a good word to describe the mindset with which I performed my task; I suppose that would constitute reacting in a negative fashion. In these situations, I exhibited adaptability in that I was not jazzed up about my role or participation in an activity, but still worked at a high level in accordance with my personal standards.

For a specific example, I remember being asked to play taps at our town's war cemetery at the conclusion of the Memorial Day parade. I thought that was a pretty neat, powerful opportunity, so I said of course I would do it. We get to the end of the parade, having marched a couple miles in the ninety-degree heat (not a lot of fun), and we were hot, sweaty, and tired. Then the band director comes up to me and says, "The people in charge of the ceremony are telling me that they might not need you, but would like you to stick around just in case." My negative reaction:  I'm pretty hacked off. Though I was nervous, I was looking forward to doing this, and it was somewhat the light at the end of the tunnel (with the tunnel being the tediousness of the parade). They cancel on me at the last minute, and they are still wanting me to commit my time? I want to go home and shower.

Long story short, I got over my initial reaction and stayed for the ceremony. I'm glad I did, because halfway through, someone came up and told me I was back on again. It ended up being a special, moving moment for me, playing taps in a cemetery for an audience of war veterans.

A major benefit of being adaptable is opening yourself up to experience opportunities. I wouldn't have had the opportunity for that experience if I had gone with my first reaction to the situation; I thought about things, sucked it up, and did something that was against my initial motivations following the parade (I.e., a shower). Adaptability allows for opportunities for success in a constantly changing world.

Leadership Vlog

Mentorship

I think the word "mentor" is thrown around pretty casually when talking about a relationship between two young people. Honestly, how vested is a kid about to be in another kid's success? It is rarely that his focus is not set on the minutia of his own life; something as universal as helping people seems to escape most children. What can a mentor, who is himself a child, offer to another child? Guidance?

Childhood is all about making mistakes, and the prefrontal cortex doesn't even fully develop until age 25. Beyond that, an adolescent has very limited power to "make something happen" in another's life - like referring that person to a job interview, or getting them an introduction to someone important.

My senior year of high school, I was in a program called "Senior Mentors" - though I'd hesitate to call what we did "mentoring" - which paired a few seniors with each freshman homeroom. Every two weeks or so, we (the mentors) would talk to the room full of freshmen about some predesignated topic, like drugs & alcohol, extracurricular activities, or preparing for college. Wait just a minute. First off, I know some of these kids had done things I couldn't even imagine doing. Secondly, I'm in band. That's my extracurricular. Nobody wants to sign up for that instant label. Third, I'm not in college yet, I have no idea what it's going to be like and what to do as a freshman to prepare for it.

I took the program seriously. I did what I could and answered questions to the best of my knowledge. I don't think it changed anyone's life though.

As for being mentored, my dad is who I've always called (and continue to call) for advice. And as I transition more into career mode, I expect that mentorship capacity will become even more important. He has three decades of experience in the industry I want to be in, doing what I want to do. I will invariably hesitate before asking him to pull any strings for me though. I the four years I will have spent grinding out this degree to get me something based on my own merit.

MBTI

There are a few reasons why I think that the MBTI is, as far as a job interview setting is concerned, one of the least-applicable of the assessments I have taken.

First, I think that the MBTI is limited in what information it provides; it shows where an individual falls on a predetermined spectrum. By nature it doesn't have anywhere to capture anything unique. It reduces a person to a number on four "this or that" scales.

Second, still continuing on the fundamentals of the test itself, under what circumstances is supposed to accurately reflect an individual's type? The most general circumstances? I would propose that a more valuable piece of information is what type a person is under pressure. That's when performance matters most. Just because some test tells me I'm usually an introvert is not reflective of how I will perform when required to do so.

And third, the MBTI is not going to be of very great concern to someone interviewing me. Here is why:  The jobs I will be interviewing for are focused on a work product (be that a system design or an approach for cutting costs or a development plan); the focus is not going to be my personality type. They will be interested in my social interaction skills, as much engineering work is team-based, but they'll likely get everything they need to know from interviewing me.

Also, offering up my MBTI in the interview will only be relevant for evaluating me as an individual; it doesn't say anything about how I will fit in with the team. What are my coworkers' MBTI scores? Do my highs and lows clash with any of theirs? Does the team have a variety of approaches to decision-making? The interviewer would have to have a frame of reference of the team.

For the reasons above, the MBTI seems impractical for my applications.

Back to the old country.

I spent my summer in Houston, Texas, enjoying family and sunshine. Being back in Ohio, I find myself missing the pleasant Gulf climate that so skillfully couples 100+ degree temperatures with near-100% humidity. My dad and his family are located in Houston, and my dad just recently started full-time as an independent oil and gas consultant. My dad loves his work, and therefore enjoys being busy. It becomes a logistical challenge when he agrees to several projects that promise to fill his schedule, and then each project ends up taking longer than anticipated.

That's where I came in. I was able to - after some instruction - assist in smaller pieces of the projects. Generally speaking, this involved the gathering and packaging of data, which my dad would then interpret using his industry expertise.

Though not a traditional one, it was indeed an internship; it gave me a view of the upstream oil and gas industry that I couldn't have found anywhere else. This summer was extraordinarily significant for me because of the time I spent with my family, in particular my baby brother. It was a unique set of the circumstances that allowed me to be with family while learning about a prospective career. Those six weeks are something I am very thankful for, especially since "Summer Break" isn't in my vocabulary anymore.

It was a great experience observing my dad at work and apprenticing from him where I could. I learned a great deal this summer, but it also served to open my eyes to the expanse of knowledge I do not possess, and the breadth of experience I can only hope to gain. And while I may be able to more accurately describe where I want to be with a career, my time down south proceeded to shine light on additional paths I can potentially take in pursuit of those achievements.

Mentorship

Sunflowers in the Windstorm

Learning Objectives

Well-Defined, Useful Goals

Why BLF?

Simple - iPads and chocolate bunnies.

Negative Space

My love for spring break came from the absence of something perilous, like school, as opposed to the addition of something awesome, like the beach.

You stay classy, San Diego.

Lessons

Okay, three lessons I've learned in this challenge process so far...complete with the situation leading up to the lesson, the actual lesson itself, and what I would do differently if presented with a similar situation in the future. I can already tell, that last part is going to be difficult; I think if "how to successfully handle a large group progressing toward a goal while maintaining enthusiasm, participation, creativity, and idea-sharing" was common knowledge, the business world would be very different than it is today. Everyone would have the tools to lead their companies effectively, making the success of the company more dependent on the talents of the individual than how they work cohesively as a team.

Lesson One:  It's hard to coordinate a meeting of nineteen people.

When we were first presented with the challenge, the logical thing to do was to get together as a group to talk about it. But that wouldn't be easy, seeing as we can't even find a time to meet officially as a full group. I remember Sarah saying something to the effect of, "After trying to schedule our weekly meetings for this quarter, I can tell you that you'll either have to meet in the middle of the night, or on Sunday. Maybe."

The complexity of logistical issues are often easy to overlook when shadows are cast on them by bigger-picture-type stuff. Again thinking of this in terms of a business setting, I am hard pressed to come up with a scenario in which nineteen members of a project team aren't located in the same office building, or don't even have similar working hours each day.

Lesson Two:  Motivation, participation, communication, hallucination.

It's difficult to make sure everyone's motivation is on the same general playing field. Enthusiasm, I think, is different; with individuals having their own interests, odds are that not everyone will love the project. But that doesn't mean that people don't have responsibilities. Relating back to lesson one, the trick is coordinating the team so that each person knows what that responsibility is. A remedy to this is heavily based in communication.

Lesson Three:  Ideation and all its glory.

Speaking as a team member - at times, it feels like the team is getting pulled slightly toward instances of groupthink. It would impractical to attempt to meet (again, lesson one) regularly as a full team to solicit input on all relevantly important issues; being still in the formative stage of this project, everything seems relatively important. Then it wouldn't be too much of a stretch of the imagination to question the system a little bit. As things have progressed, our organizational structure appears to have emerged as some sort of a representative government and its citizens. While not making the decisions, the government is creating the decisions for its citizens to make. I simply find this unexpected, as I didn't realize at the time that I essentially "elected" Joe to an oligarchy (of sorts).

My thoughts tend to be rooted in pragmatism; I usually have questions more so than answers. But one thing my parents always taught me - if I didn't have a better option for a restaurant to go to, I wasn't allowed to complain. This was to be especially in effect when I didn't mind the restaurant that everyone else had agreed upon.

My chocolate wrapper told me to buy myself flowers.

I see the weekly prompt as more of a set of guidelines to help direct my thought. Blogging is inherently an individual activity; I'm writing about what I think, correct? There's feedback for the program and self-reflection. Answering all the feedback points is important to the growth of the program, but in the case of self-reflection, it's personal. So if I stick too closely to the prompt, am I not stifling my creativity?

I think I said this last week, but in deciding not to spend the gratuitous amount of coming to weighty conclusions about my life and future, I ended up arriving at some weighty conclusions about my life and future. They are summarized as follows:

I have a general idea of where I am currently, and U have a general plan through the next year and a half. Beyond that, I don't know where I want to go with my life (airport metaphor). One of the few things I do know with certainty is that I want to be successful. And at this point in the ever-(d)evolving saga of my life, being successful meanings being able to spend an inordinate amount of time on a beach. Doing a whole lotta nothing.

On to the next one.

I think that Eddie and Sarah included our family/friends in this challenge because they were bored with seeing how the fellows interacted with each other. They wanted to mix it up, get some fresh faces and fresh personalities on the scene. Working with the same people can result in similar dynamics evolving repeatedly; you know (or think you know) how someone will act or react - the situation is lacking in ambiguity.

To fulfill their duty for continued ambiguity, they brought in a guest per person. This actually maximizes ambiguity because there are lines of communication that have already been established. BUT, only the guest's host is familiar with the guest (his or her personality, skillset, etc.); all the rest of the fellows have to annex this relationship into their social outlook.

Several fellows brought parents as their guests; this brings up something interesting. Fellows would be considered "young people" by the parents - meaning "lacking in experience". The parents, on the other hand, have a considerable amount of experience under their belts; things relevant to the challenge would be dealing with people (leading and following), adjusting and adapting to unfamiliar circumstances, cooking, eating, etc. On the other hand, the fellows have been working on their self-awareness; it doesn't make up for experience, but, it is valuable research.

From a personal standpoint, I know I'm not fully there in applying everything I learned from the extensive battery of tests I took. Regardless, the "general public" doesn't always have access to the same tools. I'm not trying to rate the merits years of experience in the real world against self-awareness. I'm trying to imply that experience doesn't lead to self-awareness, or that being a young person means you don't have any experience to draw from.

The overall I'm point trying to make is to point out the two majority groups will likely draw on different sources of information for reference when it comes to teamwork situations. The old folks have been around the block a few times, and their pools of knowledge are quite a bit deeper that ours.

With my mom their, I was on my best behavior; that meant watching my choice of adjectives and keeping the inappropriate stories to myself.

One goal that my team had was to plate all of our food by the time the clock read 00:00. It went pretty well. I definitely got a little nervous at about the four-minute mark though. My mom even mentioned it. It wasn't a bad nervous though; just reading the time off for my team (since we couldn't see the clock) making sure we had all our plates, and just helping out where I could.

I can't find my list of competencies so I'll see how this goes. Obviously communication was important. We had an initial idea session where we brainstormed possible ingredient combinations.My time made several dishes; a couple of these seemed like really solid ideas, so they got started right out of the session. As we started on them, I wrote the dishes down and crossed off required ingredients. After that, the team had a bit of fluidity; dishes came on and off the table until were settled on ones that fit our collective vision.

Although we never explicitly dictated it, our vision was defined by making top-notch dishes that incorporated the required ingredients, instead of combining the required (and other) ingredients into a dish; we were chefs first, challengees second. We looked for originality and innovation in our dishes, using both the required ingredients and some of the more random ingredients available to us. One example I remember specifically was the seviche - into which we were able to incorporate the hearts of palm; the judges observed this, and were "happy to see someone use them".

I really enjoyed this challenge. I think my team being awesome was a large part of that. Another major contributor was my affection toward. I like cooking, though I may not be very good at it; I love eating, and I think that love looks fondly back on the preparation process. The challenge was beneficial for all of the ambiguity stuff I talked about above, and because the environment itself was something new. New is always better.

One key thing though - while I graciously accepted the opportunity to NOT clean up after myself, the clean up crew took our food before we were done eating it! I barely filled my plate the first time around, thinking that I'd have the opportunity to get seconds. And I didn't even get my own bread pudding...I had to try it off of the judges plate.

It's rush hour.

And Reflection is like that semi that's trying to merge into my lane in front of me, and I really want to let him, because I'm a nice guy and all, but I'm late for my flight and going to go ahead make the justification that keeping this one vehicle out of my path is necessary. Nice guys finish last.

Is this irony? The other cars in my life represent all the stuff I have to do. There's other eighteen wheelers. And the lane I'm in is my life today. And because of all the other cars already in my lane, I really don't want to let this streetcar named Reflection merge into my lane at the moment. He's one of those double-tractor-trailer units and everyone knows how long they take to get over. Metaphor explained:  I don't come to conclusions easily, especially when they're about me.


Earlier I said I was late for my flight. I guess that makes the airport the proverbial "end of the day". Where am I headed? Eh. Maybe if I'd taken the extra few minutes to let Reflection in, I might've given my travel plans an adequate amount of thought. Time to throw darts at the departure board.

That reminds me of my man Jimmy Buffett. In "Changes in Latitudes" he says that reading departure signs in some big airport reminds him of the places he's been. I have a couple of exceptions in mind, but I think for me it would be mostly the opposite; that list of departures would remind me of the places I haven't been.

James goes on to talk about how he thinks about Paris when he's high on red wine. That would be somewhere I'd like to go. I watched the movie Midnight In Paris recently. I know I'd be nowhere near as appreciative of all the culture as Owen Wilson's character was, at least not at first - just for lack of knowledge. I might decide to move there, like he does, and meet a nice French girl, and come home from work for a two hour lunch everyday, and find the holy grail, and hate on America even though they saved France on multiple occasions... I want to see if I fit into Paris's legendary romance.

Or French Polynesia. That was my plan in high school. Head out to French Polynesia and become a pearl diver. Their economy basically runs on pearls like ours runs on cheap Chinese-manufactured goods. Actually that's a bad analogy seeing as the key to the cheap costumer goods is that they're made in China - i.e. imported. French Polynesia exports the pearls...I guess I can't make an analogy after all because the United States doesn't export anything anymore.

Better plan - if what I want is a beach, maybe I'll lucky and my plane will crash on a beautiful, mysterious island and I'll just get Lost.

In conclusion I decided to avoid the real meat of this post by going off on a tangent instead. I think in doing so, I actually got some of the potatoes. Where am I headed? To the airport. For what purpose? To catch a flight. Where? I don't know yet. Why? Don't know that either. Maybe I'll do some reflection once I get there.

The airport is both the destination of a journey and the beginning of its own journey; I suppose I could get stuck in the airport like Tom Hanks did in Terminal, in which case I will be a little disappointed.

Haters Gonna Hate...Sarah

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death

Is it important to be creative?
If creativity itself is important, then it is important to be creative. I'm going to employ a mathematically syllogistic argument to answer the question of whether creativity is important.

The assumption:
Happiness is good; frustration is inversely proportional to happiness, so decreasing frustration is important because it maintains happiness.

The facts:
School is frustrating.

School is a creativity-deficient environment (my references:  memorization of random facts and regurgitation of the professor's opinions).

The conclusion:
A possible correlation exists between the occurrence of frustration and the scarcity of creativity; frustration and creativity seem to be inversely proportional as well, because when creativity is absent, frustration abounds. There is also an assumed relationship between frustration and happiness, saying that the minimization of frustration is important to maintaining happiness.

One can maintain happiness by decreasing frustration; the decrease of frustration is accompanied by an increase in creativity. Therefore, the important function of happiness maintenance is served by an increase creativity.

Thus proved, creativity is important, due to its direct relationship to happiness.


Play? Please.
The last time I engaged in play (I think) was the disproportionate amount of time I just spent trying to use logic to avoid that trick question, "Is it important to be creative?" That in and of itself raises a red flag; the fact that I used logic to attempt to describe something inherently unrelated to logic. The phrase "exercise in futility" comes to mind.

Call it a myth, I call it fact:  I'm just not a creative person. I mean, the existence of a majestic creature like Nessie is a perfect example of the subjectivity of the word "myth"; it's pretty clear that she exists, and some people just refuse to get in touch with reality.

But seriously, on the play thing, I'm not sure I know how to play anymore. Everything feels like work. There's so many expectations to attempt to fulfill, so many standards to try and achieve. And they're all social constructs. It's baloney. I was just thinking last night, I miss the old days when I'd be pulling an all-nighter to play video games. Now I spend an all-nighter planning my next all-nighter.

*
I'd hardly call any of my daily activities "play"; the closest I come is probably watching sports or a movie or something. I love reading, but don't do it much in my free time these days; I usually try to avoid continuing the assault that the English language unavoidably delivers to my eyeballs all day. Unfortunately, because of the amount of time I wasted with my logical pursuit of happiness, I won't be able to delve too deeply into my cerebral cortex. Any attempt to find answers just begets more questions. I may have just had a breakthrough though - maybe the absence of creativity in me is because I forgot how to play?

This reminds me of that episode of Scrubs where J.D. has "man cards", and Dr. Cox takes them in response to J.D.'s unmanly actions...I feel like I just lost a man card for my "breakthrough". It just sounds pathetic somehow. Helpless. LAME. I think it was more of a connection than a breakthrough anyway, and a pretty obvious one at that. Definitely not worth losing a man card. Do they reset the card count at the end of the day, or what? If the reset comes at the end of the week, I might be in trouble.

A question that keeps coming back to me:  Should creativity have objectives? I said something similar a couple paragraphs ago. I have a thought that going into a situation with a predisposition toward its conclusion is something that could stifle creativity. And a predisposition could be anything - an expectation, an objective, even a goal. I suppose there's a distinction between knowing the endgame and knowing the journey. And I just had another musing on the idea of thought conditioning that I mentioned a couple weeks ago.

So maybe there's two tracks for my train of thought to travel down. One is creative, and one has been created in me - whether it be through school or experience or logic; I could just be a jaded old man. This second track is the one I've been conditioned to take whenever I have to get something done. It is really analytic. The train is given a destination, and it embarks on the analytic journey - I analyze the way to get to the destination. In that way, I don't think I can really make that mental distinction between journey and destination, at least as far as creativity is concerned. I guess I'm an all or nothing guy - you give me creativity of the destination AND the journey, or I'm not going to take any creativity at all.
*

I still need to read those articles that we got at the museum so I can get a better idea of what the people who study creativity think about it. The main takeaway I had was that "creativity" is now associated with "fun" in my mind; as far as applying fun to my daily life, or to the challenge, I'm drawing a blank. There's tons of songs about taking time for yourself. That's not something I have a problem with; I procrastinate with the best of them. [Like how I'm using this blog post to procrastinate studying for my multiple midterms.] But it's making use of that time in a way...I don't even know; in a way that helps me have fun, I guess? I'll try and get that fun back.

As for my autobiography...I would probably write the chapters, and then go back and title them, unless there was a specific story I wanted to tell. Generally speaking, I would expect it to be a more illusrated (literally illustrated, that would be awesome) version of the section of this post contained within the asterisks*. I would probably add some colorful language, and perhaps support my ramblings with some stories.

Like the section above, it would just be me - making statements, noting observations, asking questions, providing counterpoints (to my own points), despairing over my lack of knowledge, trying to be funny, cursing some person or organization or object, making references to my idea of pop culture, criticizingand contradicting and arguing with myself - really just rambling. I'm a ramblin' man.

Oh, and feedback.

When grilling a steak, there are several ways a person can have his or hers cooked. The rarest of rare steaks, on the grill for the shortest amount of time, could probably be brought back to life by a good veterinarian. Conversely, a well-done steak has the texture and chewiness of shoe leather; the longer it's on the grill, the more dried-out it gets. Let's say that feedback is like a steak, and the juiciness of the steak is the amount of "sugar-coating" the feedback has. I'd order my steak rare, but if I get medium rare, I'm not going to send it back to the kitchen - I've seen Waiting.

Metaphors aside, I prefer constructive criticism, with a little something nice on the side. Maybe tell me that my posture has been particularly good as of late, or perhaps brighten my day with some candy...YES. Bring me candy - Butterfingers are my favorite - then tell me how I dropped the ball. Also, I'm not going to pretend I know everything, so if you want to give me some pointers on how to improve, please do. I believe that's the "constructive" in "constructive criticism".

...get it? Hilarious.

Classic Browns; nice one, butterfingers...

Strengths...Skills...?

Strengths:

- Harmony
- Individualization
- Deliberative
- Intellection
- Empathy

Last quarter...not really sure which one I employed to any great effect. 60% of my strengths don't make any sense; I think about things a lot (often times, too much), so that explains deliberative and intellection. But the other three are relationship things that I rarely find myself involved in. I have a sneaking suspicion that StrengthsQuest is just messing with me by pulling those last three characteristics out of a random generator. I want a redo.

If I had to pick one I would probably go with deliberative; off the top of my head, it's the only one I can remember a specific instance of using it. The big thing I was trying to make happen was to get some t-shirts made. I contacted a bunch of places and got some quotes and finally settled on one company. Everything was in place except funding; we'd collected only enough money to fund a third of our intended order. Obviously we couldn't use money we didn't have. There was also the time constraint of the project - if we didn't the order the shirts early enough, there would be no time for them to make an impact. It came down to either not purchasing the shirts, or purchasing a smaller batch. After thinking through the angles of the situation and collecting input and advice, the decision was made to forgo the shirts.

It was an effective decision because the point in time at which the order was to be placed, as well as the financial situation, would have resulted in an above-average possibility that the shirts would be more trouble than they were worth. Choosing not to purchase the shirts was both fiscally responsible and saved the team a potential headache (on top of our other headaches).

Thinking of skills always reminds me of Napoleon Dynamite. You've gotta have great skills.

My skills...Well. I'm pro at sleeping. Not in the typical places, mind you, like airplanes or school buses. I'm talking about in locations I can actually fit, i.e. stretch out, I'm good to go and not likely to wake up for anything short of a tornado. Eating. I finished the Thurmanator, you can ask my mom; and that was after four or five of Thurman's full-sized chicken wings. On the "Online Ferrari Community" (weird), someone clocked the Thurmanator at 3600 calories, 2100 of which were from fat. That leads me into my next thing, I don't know if I'd call it a "skill" so much as a "preference" or something, but I'm kind of a numbers guy. Also, logical. I tend toward thinking situations and actions through carefully, sometimes to an unnecessary extent. Oh well. I like to think, though, that I can consider the multiple points of view associated with a given situation. I do have opinions, some more firmly rooted than others, but I am open to considering other perspectives. Caveat (going along with my foundation in logic) - it needs to be a solid argument, and I have to understand the reasoning.

I realize that the previous paragraph was less a list of skills and more of an "about me" type-thing. I was hoping if I typed enough that things would just appear to answer the question, "What are my skills?", but I'm not sure that happened. I am my own worst critic, as they say. If anyone has observed any particular skills that I possess - like being tall, or having an uncommon (yet quite alluring) hair color - feel free to let me know.

As far as the "skills" are related to the challenge, these are my thoughts:  I recall the presentation at orientation about perfecting strengths as opposed to developing weaknesses; however, I think there are certain essential skills, let's call them competencies, that one must be at least proficient in to be successful. Learning and developing accompany experience.

I wouldn't call my relationship/interpersonal savvy "weak"; apparently neither would StrengthsQuest. Nonetheless, the thought I put into what I would like to do in planning this conference culminated in building relationships. An important part of this conference is the relationships we create with the community, the alumni, businesses, students, etc., so I see no shortage of need for the role of this kind of communicator.

Conference Challenge

Initial Reactions: it sounded like an intriguing concept, obviously very open-ended. That made for an interesting group discussion, hearing the different takes on the project. Although the presentation lacked any detailed direction, it seems like the nature of the program itself is an expectation of the direction of the project. I'm not quite sure how to explain it other the group discussion almost felt like it was being pulled toward a particular destination.

Conspiracies are real. Some of them.

Perhaps that was due to the exceptional collection of intelligence in the room; that would mean that educated thought will always tend to focus on topics like progress and innovation. Plausible. On the other hand, could this particular gathering of brainpower conceivably be exhibiting a conditioning to to a certain school of thought, i.e. the future, making the conclusion inevitable? This isn't necessarily negative, since the world is led by those on the cutting edge of development; however, that's not to say it is free from signs of the man behind the curtain. Or men behind the curtain, as the Founding Fathers created this country in the spirit of growth. America is a giant conspiracy geared toward progress.

All the same, neither seem to reflect on what can be learned from the past. As I listened to the challenge presentation, this is the track on which my thoughts placed me; my brain didn't impulsively align itself with the enlightenment of advancement. What does this say about me? A reasonable conclusion is that it could signify a lack of intelligence, or perchance, a lack of the correct thought conditioning. But either way, it seems as if I am destined to be swept up in a wave of modernization.


Biggest Fears: Nonfactor on account of my fearlessness, but there are a few possible things about the project that would suck. For instance, it would suck if I get stuck doing something lame. There's a limited number of roles that can emerge from this project, and it's always a possibility that all the good jobs get taken, or there aren't any good jobs to begin with. It would also be less-than-ideal if the project ate into my REM cycles, like what happened last quarter.


Largest Hopes: I hope to find a role that I enjoy and that allows me to experience something new. Being as this challenge will span more than a year, I hope to put the time to good use and develop something in myself while working on it.


Expectations: I think Peter La Fleur puts it very well. "I found that if you have a goal, that you might not reach it. But if you don't have one, then you are never disappointed." I expect myself to do my best, as the good old cliché goes. Other than that, I just want to learn something from my experience, and to have a significant takeaway. As far as the group goes, I would say that we are capable of putting on a good show, but I am keeping in mind the magnitude of this undertaking.


Core Competencies: I think that the first thirteen of the competencies are are evidently going to be involved in the challenge. Cultural competency may or may not be a factor, depending on our programming for the conference and if there was a decision to target a specific cultural audience.

Why not protest in goggles?

Is it really America's best and brightest - armed with a deft understanding of the function of the country - out on the streets waving signs, gettin' rowdy, "protesting"? Let's watch and see:  the commotion brings out the cops, who bring out the pepper spray...which affects the eyes. Yet, there's not a pair of goggles to be seen as the protesters are peppered into submission; the "best and brightest" statement may have been inaccurate.

This understandably puts protesters in quite a pickle. While incapacitated by the pepper spray, they are unable to accomplish their goal of bothering the rest of us with whatever their agglomeration of complaints happens to be for that day.

Coming up short of a goal is not uncommon, and not something that discriminates according to the intelligence level of those affected. The best laid plans of mice and men, and all that jazz. That said, it should come of no surprise that combining several high-achieving, idealistic youngsters with a grand undertaking (involving two enormous universities in a fundraising effort, in only eight weeks), resulted in benchmarks not being met.

As far as BiggerThanTheGame goes, our goals themselves were not unreasonable, considering the plan for the project; it was just a little on the naive side to think that our incredible amount of logistics could be coordinated in such a short time frame. This begs an interesting question; obviously it's case-by-case, but at what point does idealism begin to tread on the toes of naivety?

Having little to no experience with coordination efforts myself, the biggest thing I experienced through this project was a reality check. I thought it was reasonable for a someone to reply within twenty-four hours, as their website states. Reality check - that is actually unreasonable.

Make no mistake, BiggerThanTheGame was a success. A raucous, pool-party-worthy success. The time frame was just off by a couple of days. If we'd only had until the Sunday after the game... At this juncture, though, the important thing is being able to pick up and dust off from this little scrap with our eight-weeks-younger selves, to get back on the horse.

New goals for BiggerThanTheGame in Twenty-Twelve:  I'd say student organization status is in order, along with a sister organization at the University of Michigan. And for sure - next time "The Game" rolls around, we are going to have some t-shirts.