Trials from Experience

     Over the past eight years of being in the Military, I’ve heard a lot of advice from all sorts of

people from all over the world. There hasn’t been any that had stuck with me that I continue to

think about daily. I know that with life itself you have to push yourself as much as you can, if you

ever want to achieve your goals you have set for yourself. Furthermore, you have to follow what

your hearts you when it comes to finding a career through college: “With time, I learn that interest

and success are highly correlated – do what you love, and you’ll be good at what you do” (Ward).

Lastly, even JK Rowling, has to say, “as is a tale so is life, not how long it is but how good it is, is what

matters”. She has the ability to inform students of college that even a story is life, so live your live

because that what truly matters not the small insignificant things that will get in the way. Over all,

advice can be given from anyone or anything, but what truly matters is how you perceive life and

what you want from it. After a couple years you’ll be able to have advice to help others that are

currently going through the same boat you once was in.

The Things We Shouldn't Take for Granted

     While living in America we have all sorts of freedoms open and granted to us, unlike other

counties. Some can say they are envious, while others can say we grown to be pompous because of

the liberties that we have. A lot of young adults take these freedoms for granted. One can be

school, many children and teenagers skip, fail, or just don’t go to school period. They can care less

about education, while in other parts of the world a lot of children aren’t able to go to school. They

have to fight just to earn an education. As the story of the young teenage from Pakistan, who was

shot in the head point blank from a terrorist organization for speaking out about rights for women

to go to school.

     Another important freedom is our right for freedom of speech. It was the first amendment to be

put within our constitution. Our ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War just to be able to have

this right. While other counties censor the right of freedom of speech. North Korea was a

communist country from 1948-2014. Underneath there rule a lot of information was censor. If they

had spoke out about the government you were silenced publicly or behind closed doors. This

doesn’t happen in American because of our constitutional right as Americans.

Emotions

     Can you teach empathy; I feel that empathy can and cannot be taught to a person. Some can

debate that you are born with it and then other says you learn it while going through experiences in

life. I think that young adults who are sheltered in there upbringing have a hard time understanding

how a person feels and copes with certain situations. While adults that grew up in poverty can

understand how a person who loses a job and starts there journey into depression can relate to

them because of their life experiences. Even with websites Rootsofempathy.org you still not about

to learn how to have compassion towards others that you interact with.

     With all the different emotions that a human can have, empathy is one of the most important

traits an individual should have. I recently watched a video about a photographer in New York going

around taking pictures of random people and having them display themselves in different

encounters from family portraits, to relationships poses, even friends taking a group picture. I found

it interesting their response to how it felt after taking such photos with people they just met. One

person talked about how at first they were nervous then was about to calm down and truly enjoy

the photo, she said it was a feeling that was there. That emotion she was talking about was

empathy, without so would have been a cold statue, unemotional. I believe that without empathy

the world would become a cold desolate place of uncaring people.

How do you praise your students?

     The way we teach our students is one thing, but when it comes to praising our new generation

we shouldn’t tell them to how smart they are. After reading an article about “How Not to Talk to

Your Kids”, it made me begin to think where my life in elementary school and the progression of

school itself went. The major idea that circumference the whole topic was not to tell your child they

are “smart”, the reason being it lead to the child to pick easy questions or give up all together, so to

have the idea of being intelligent. When I was in middle school I was given an IQ test to see where I

stand among my peers in the Individualized Education Program (IEP), after the test I was told I had

an IQ of 121. Ever since then I can recall I never tried my hardest and seek the easier questions to

answers to have that ability to say I am smart. When I was in elementary school I was diagnosed

with a learning disability for writing and reading, at that young age I always had this stigma that I’m

a horrible writer or I read too slowly. I’ve had plenty of extra help along my school years, but the

most detrimental period was my freshmen English class. The teacher had told me that because of

my learning disability I can never get my ideas onto paper. It wasn’t until my junior year that I had

met Mrs. Schmidt, she began to work with me on the progress of writing an essay. She found that I

was able to learn visually, and taught me the structure of an essay, each key components that went

along with it. After which I started to write poems, she had taught me that with poems you write

the most direct way possible to get your idea across with each line. She always praised me in a way

to improve, to write more descriptive, motivated me to have a greater result within my writing.

More than ten years has passed, as I begin my journey through college and with it every day I can

recall the help Mrs. Schmidt had put into helping me.

Days of a dying past, revolution of Social Media

     How important is social media? With today's growth of information through the use of the

internet it has made information easily accessible. With different applications, webpages, social

networks, and blogs has made it more easy than just a simple one on one person conversation to get

your points across to the general public. The use of using hashtags and twitter to get the word out

to the world has become profound.

     The use of "#askhermore Movement" has pushed the boundaries of allowing the public to get

involved in equality on the red carpet when being asked questions. On one occasion Keira Knightly

was asked, "How she balances being newly married with her career". She sharply replied with, "Are

you going to ask all the men that tonight?". At one event Jennifer Garner shared an anecdote that

reporters were more interested in hearing from her husband about Emily Ratajkowski breast from

his movie Gone Girl. Such actors as Reese Witherspoon has renewed interest on the movement

during one red carpet event by posting on her Instagram using the hashtag, saying "We are more

than our dresses,". After reading a blog from Tobi Gbile I was made aware of such a movement.

Without social media I would have never heard of such a movement.

     In "Clay Shirky: How social media can make history" he discusses how the use of Twitter spread

the information of China's May 2008 Earthquake spread like wildfire around the world. The citizens

of China were uploading pictures, taking videos, texting other people of the 7.9 magnitude

earthquake. The British news network The BBC caught wind of the earthquake from Twitter even

before China's Government was aware of it. With the use of such social networks like Twitter the

natural disaster was able to be known to the world before any type of agency was made aware of it.

     In conclusion, I feel that social media is important. Not only for a person's leisure when being

bored at home, work, school, or everyday life. It's important because when grim situations happen

you're able to push out information further than your own general society, state, nation, and

continent.

First day

First post on my new blog. So my name is Kris, I'm from originally from Bellflower, CA but I moved to Oregon for most of my life. Around the age of seventeen I moved to Arizona and stayed here until nineteen before I enlisted in the Army. My favorite quote is from an author called Carlos Ruiz Zafon, this quote is from his book Angel's Game.

"Poetry is written with tears, fiction with blood, history with invisible ink," said the cardinal, as he spears poison on the knife edge by the light of a candelabra.

Some of  my hobbies are reading manga, when I find a good book I'll spend hours reading. Other hobbies is traveling. I just started driving this year, so I enjoy driving the distance. My intended Major is in Information Technology, the reason being is I was a Information Technology Specialist for the Army for eight years. Right now in life, that is truly a good question. I am a father, starting school for the first time in close to a decade, had my second deployment a year ago. Something that is important to you? That question has always been asked to me over the years. After being a father for the past two years, I would have to see is that my son is the most important thing to me in this world. To see him smile and run to me yelling "daddy" is just as special as the moment I heard his first cry at birth. My life goal, very hard to honestly answer never put much thought into these kinds of questions of "self", the closet thing would have to be to honestly have a family.