Artifact 3

This year has been one that started off with a bang, my mom was hospitalized for a week and almost lost her life, my home country was invaded and a war broke out, and financial differences created so much stress. For a while it began impacting my everyday life and I felt overwhelmed. Stress was the main reason and I knew that I could not sustain being in that mindset for long. I choose to do this particular assignment because I wanted to see if my happiness level changed. I read chapter 12 and without even realizing it I implemented some of the managing stress techniques, I started to talk about my difficulties with friends, I started to work out more, and I even joined a bible study group. Instead of having “mommy guilt” whenever my daughter watched more then 30 minutes of tv, I realized that I needed that break. I started to implement self forgiveness without even realizing the term. I also started to write down weekly goals and worked harder to achieve them. In turn my mindset went from grief to happiness. Perseverance helped me be able to adjust my mindset on life.

Artifact 2

This last month has been extremely difficult for my family and I. With the war that is taking place in my country, most of my family is stuck in Ukraine. Some have been in bomb shelters while others are preparing to go to them. Most of them have such empathy for the Russian soldiers even though they are destroying our country. While others have this insane amount of anger towards them. Most of the world has now turned their backs on all Russian people and labeling them. This is why I chose to do the stereotype assignment, even though I have my own perspective on this war I wanted to challenge myself to open my mind on various committees.

With this situation I realized that I needed to challenge my own prejudice against what is happening in my country. Likewise I will also need to make sure I do not allow myself to believe any of the new stereotypes that will be coming out soon. I have to broaden my mind and educate myself on different cultures. When I was stationed in Bahrain I had a fear of possibly being harmed for being an American military personnel. It was only after I immersed myself in the culture I realized how amazing the middle eastern culture was. One of my goals right now is to not allow myself to get in a mindset of the us versus them affect.

I choose this imagine because it is a direct reflection of us versus them movement. Due to one mans decision to invade and cause destruction. Millions if not billions of lives are now affected. This is heart breaking in the aspect that people are always judged on where they are from not who they are. Even though my family is in imminent danger and my childhood town maybe destroyed. I never want to have this kind of hate towards anyone.

Artifact 1

I am a person that loves to learn and reflect on my own actions. The self across situations was an assignment that allowed me to truly be cognitive about myself throughout the week. As certain situations occurred throughout the week I had to really think about my actions and if they are consistent with every situation. I think this assignment really helped me understand myself on a deeper level, and even made me wonder why I behave the way that I do. 

I really enjoyed this assignment because it made me reflect to the chapter we were reading and also allowed me to have a deeper understanding. The thing that surprised me the most is how natural it felt to reflect back on certain situations and look from a different perspective. It made me realize that although I would like to say that I know myself fairly well there is still so much to learn. For instance I still would like to understand my reactions to certain things and this assignment is something that I will try again to learn more about myself. 

The main reason I chose this photo is because while I was doing this assignment this was how I felt. Throughout the week I had a few instances where I had to stop and think why did I behave in that way. In other situations some of my reactions felt as if they were second nature. So throughout the week I kept a journal of what was happening around me and the way I responded and I truly felt as if I was doing a puzzle.