Projects like these have always seemed very
cheesy and childish to me, but as I grow older, I realize the importance more
and more of them. Maybe I lacked the
maturity or commitment, but know it makes me understand the importance of self-reflection
and knowing who you are. Knowing your
goals, strengths, and weaknesses are keys to getting to where you want to go
and being who you want to be. After some
deep thought I began the personal strengths / weaknesses and then after some discussion
with a few friends and family I created the next few paragraphs. I hope this reflection that can help me figure
out where I stand at this point in my life and use it to learn the next steps
needed in my life and motivate myself for the future.
Personal Strengths
I begin this project with self-reflection of
what I believe I am strongest at. A strong
trait that I have carried throughout my life is the ability to motivate myself towards
going all out in something I love doing.
When I feel passionate, I become obsessed with being the best I can be
and achieving my goals. My most time-consuming
activity has always been volleyball and it is something I love doing. I first started playing when 15 years old and
really had no idea it would take me all the way to State Playoffs in high
school and a very talented club team here at U of I. I was able to break a school record at my position,
something I had been striving to do since I was a freshman in high school. It is during these moments where I learned
the true power of believing in yourself and going all out. This is where I discovered the idea that hard
work pays off, a lesson that will stick with me throughout my professional
career and personal life for the rest of my life. Also, I believe this thought me how to be
mentally tough because to succeed in any sport at a high level you need to be
disciplined and have a strong mindset.
Another positive characteristic I think I have
is that I like to take on challenges and am not afraid to try. This may be classified as stupidity by some,
but I have high expectations of myself and therefore will challenge myself to
be the best I can be and therefore, partake in things where I am in far over my
head. This will tie into a weakness of
mine later, but I feel it is important to mention it here in my strengths because
I value it. I will go through a few examples
that mainly pertain to my academic life.
Something positive that I am proud of is getting into my major of Econometrics
and taking on a computer science minor, which many people told me I would fail
(haven’t yet, fingers crossed). Next,
when I first got on campus, I tried to join a top business fraternity. I was one of two people to show up in shorts
and was quite embarrassed. Obviously, I
did not get a second-round interview. A
last one to quickly touch on the many, I set my sights on transferring into the
College of Business, which I later learned I needed a 4.0 for and did not come
close to meeting the requirements. While
all of these were catastrophic failures, I feel that they were necessary
experiences that I will carry with me all throughout life. Nobody is perfect and we all make mistakes,
so I’m glad that I at give myself a chance at succeeding. As they say, shoot for the stars and if you
miss you’ll land on the moon.
Personal Weaknesses
Hopefully, none
of these weaknesses come back to hurt me at some point in my life, but here we
go. The first I would like to start with
is a that I can be undisciplined on certain aspects of my life. I know myself well enough to know that I will
give a much lesser, and sometimes even poor effort, on things I do not care for
and should. I guess we can frame this as
stubbornness and a lack of discipline. For
example, I have never been very into school and have failed to realize the
importance of a professional career up until about 2 years ago. My hardest subject has always been writing. When I try and put the focus and effort into
my pieces, I can actually enjoy my writing and come off as somewhat
intelligent. I often get frustrated when
I cannot write as well or articulate myself at the highest level even though I expect
such things and know that I am capable of.
Touching back on the goals setting I mentioned earlier, I think
I need to have more realistic goals that I can focus on day to day. This is because up until 2 years ago I had absolutely
0 idea of what how to get potential jobs I would be interested in or a future
career path I could narrow myself down to.
All I said was finance, but I really didn’t know what I wanted at the
time. During college visits I didn’t put
much effort into my choice or do any research on clubs / programs / or really
anything above the basic level. As I
move forward in life, I feel this is quite possibly my biggest obstacle I face,
especially now moving into the job market.
I started my college career mainly focused on a social life and have
since had to do a complete 180 towards turning myself into a valued professional. I have to make myself as aware I can and put
in the work by trying new clubs, researching about job positioning, and having
serious conversations with myself about where I want to be and how I can get
there. I know that this can be painfully
slow for me, but it is literally my future, so I need to take my time and if I
get stuck just to work a bit harder and get through it.
A second
weakness, which is a two-parter is I can be very cocky of somethings and also
very afraid of others. The more I grow
older and experience things the more I realize that I have been far too cocky about
life itself and had a bad perspective and attitude. I always thought that I
I knew what I was doing and that I shouldn’t join clubs or
anything and I would be just fine playing volleyball. As it turns out it is not and before College,
I did a work tour which I really liked and didn’t have the maturity to admit it
at the time. I think these can be fixed with by trying to be a better well-rounded
individual and having mental toughness, like I used in volleyball. I read through the example given and one very
interesting take away I had was he mentioned how he came into college expecting
to talk with faculty as vessels to help excel his career and not be afraid to
approach them and other students. This
is something I feel that I fear and shy away from. I feel very uncomfortable and lack confidence
n certain adamic situations even though I know I should feel more comfortable
and this is something I need to work on and improve for the future.
Strengths
The first strength
that many told me was that I was able to be very social and kind. This is most likely a little biased because it
came from those who I’m around all the time, but nonetheless, is a positive. This surprised me a bit because I often times
feel that I can be very anxious around people and I do get nervous. As I mentioned in my weaknesses I am often
afraid to talk to people who are superior to me, so I feel I can take this into
the future. Another strength I got, was that I can be very motivated and consistent. Again, I feel this is biased because my friends may not know how my entire academic career has gone, so this may be a polling error. I do feel that this could be somewhat true because I did motivate myself enough to get into a decent major and do very well in volleyball.
Weaknesses
My feature benefit
This
may not have been the most uplifting or inspiring thing you’ve ever read, but
I know that whatever I find myself doing I will be busting my ass to be as
great as I can. Will I make some errors
along the way and go through some struggles?
Most likely, seems like that is just life, but I’m
working on and I love a good challenge. From
where I started in my career and personal life to where I am now makes me believe
I can do great things. All I see is shocking growth in my life and I can only see myself growing
more and more, and it’s exciting.
