21ST JANUARY - 28TH JANUARY
Thank you all who have contributed to my blog and for the words of encouragement.
This has been a pretty intense week; in fact it is hard to believe that it is only a week since I started blogging!
I have spent a lot of time being a family leader in particular at the end of last week and during the weekend. Both my sons have their birthdays 2 days apart, so that always requires making time to think about and buy presents and organize either a special dinner and cake or an outing or something. This year was my youngest son's
19th birthday and my eldest son arranged for a nightclub event over on the mainland. So I was busy with the normal purchasing of presents and arranging for a cake to be sent to the restaurant where we were all going to meet up and then coordinating with friends and family, and deciding whether we should book a suite at a hotel down town so that no one had to drive. There seems to always be something that trips you up in my family, like getting to the restaurant and finding out that the folk responsible for bringing the presents there left them in the taxi! That caused a bit of panic, but with the help of city dwellers, we were able to track them down and get them to the restaurant without too much stress. It was a great event with a big turn out and everyone had a blast. For Bon and myself it was quite a learning curve in experiencing today's nightclubs, I felt like I was going down into a dungeon to where this very different kind of music was playing called dub step. It is a loud drum base beat, which seems to be the new thing, interesting!
Pascale, Chris and I interviewed Micki last Thursday. She was very honoured that we chose her as she seemed to think there were other leaders that were better qualified for this assignment. I am not sure that I totally agree with her as I feel she plays a significant leadership role in all our lives right through the program. This became evident as we progressed through the interview as she mentioned the importance on her part of being aware of the growth that takes place throughout the 4 years with the students and how her leadership has to accommodate that. She is one instructor that really gets to know us on a more personal level, I think, as she feels she needs to understand what it is we are looking for and in order to help us find what we want she needs to take the time to get to know us on that more personal level. That also plays a role in how she works with each of us individually as a leader. One thing that struck me with a disciple that she works on, is taking enough time at the end of the day and reflecting on her day to see what worked and what did not work so well. This is an exercise that she feels strongly about as it helps her to see where she can improve her leadership abilities and take action if need be in areas that need the attention. I would say that Micki is being strategic and innovative in her style of leadership.
This week in class we looked at the importance of understanding our strengths and weaknesses, whether dressing formally is an important strategy, the importance of self reflection, evaluating self, developing and maintaining confidence and taking risks.
Understanding strengths and weaknesses I believe is a life long journey. As Micki says taking the time to reflect on your day and assessing what went well and why and what did not go as well as intended and why and what went terribly wrong and why, is a good tool to see where you have weaknesses and where your strengths lie. The biggest challenge here is being disciplined and allowing self the time to do the reflection. In my present reality time is the challenge, it is like finding time for exercise, that too is important, and it is a challenge to make room for all these things. So then balance comes into play and figuring out what is the propriety order that works best for you. That comes around to whether you have the strength to be disciplined!
I did the Enneagram test and I guess there was nothing too surprising that came out of that. There was confirmation that I strive for perfectionism, so I guess it is time that I accept that truth. I have been accused of being too hard on myself and setting high standards, but I have not recognized that within me, so maybe there is truth there. My other high scores are helpfulness, adventurousness and anxiety. I do have to agree with anxiety being a weakness of mine. This I find is a difficult trait to conquer. The book I am reading "Feel the Fear and then do it anyway" is brilliant in trying to help me understand fear and how it can freeze you if you don't know how to live with fear and understanding it is just part of growing stronger. Hopefully this knowledge will benefit me in growing stronger and conquering anxiety.
Being adventurous is definitely something I am aware of. I thrive on the unexpected and the unknown. My adventurousness is not driving at dangerous speeds or jumping out of airplanes, it is more of handling crisis situations or doing whatever it takes to get to where ever I need to get to. I am not someone who can live in a consistent and safe environment; I need that uncertainty and unexpectedness. It must be something to do with coming from Africa. Consistency, certainty and safety become very boring for me.
Enough talking, I am now going to "try" and post this without losing it all!
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