January 16, 2012
Personal 101 – Self-Evaluation and Fore-planning
Hobbies What did you enjoy doing as a child? What do you enjoy doing now in your free time? If money and time were no object, what would spend your time doing?
As a child, I enjoyed Theatre, Television, playing instruments, reading books, singing for my classmates, learning, video games, and driving miniature cars. Today, NOTHING has changed. I love performing in Theatre, watching Friends, playing the Piano and the Harmonica and my replica Ocarina from Legend of Zelda, reading Tolkien and Young Adult fiction, singing for anybody who will hear, challenging myself spiritually and mentally, playing the occasional video game, and driving my Toyota. 
I really, and brutally honestly do not think I would change that with all the money in the world. Granted, I may do it in some tropical paradise instead of Indiana, but the actions would be the same. hahaha.
Career As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? What would be your ideal career now? Again, don’t limit yourself to money requirements, locations, or even your education at this time. The job doesn’t even have to exist; this is just a way to get to know yourself at a deeper level. Dream for a bit, see what happens!
When I was a child, I wanted to perform on Broadway. I wanted to be up in the lights and have everybody clap for me, because I knew they liked it when I clapped for them. My ideal career is not far off from that. Certainly, Broadway is a goal. Yet, I am not so sure I would like to be bound by it. I can see myself in Broadway, Opera, Jazz, Cabaret, and any other performing art. As a dream job, I’d be happily performing all the time for everyone. A job I knew very well so I would have a lot of free time to do the hobbies I have above. I dream of singing my favorite roles over and over again and making people happy. Entertainment is all I have ever known and all I ever really care to know. I am a healer in that way.
Education If time and money were not issue, what would you want to learn more about? This includes your Jedi path – if we had our ideal situation of an offline Academy or Temple, what would you hope to learn and focus on? Be as specific as possible.
Oh dear! I’d go to LAW school, and medical school. I’d be an OB-GYN. I would be an entertainment lawyer or a Supreme Court Justice. All dream jobs that I could never bring myself to do for some reason, probably my hatred for American justice system and/or health field. Jedi-wise, I think DAILY about an offline Jedi Temple. A place where I could go and meditate in a chamber and work in a place where nobody would bother me about what I was supposed to do or try to engage in “small-talk”. GOD I hate small-talk. It’s not useful. I would want to learn to fight and become muscular and strong. I would focus on it daily and sing and read at night once my training was over. Perfect existence.
Personality What do you consider to be your strengths? For instance, are you good at making deci-sions? Are you creative? This is a very general question to get you to think in general about your strengths. No strength is too ‘small’ or insignificant, so share whatever you come up with.
My list of ten strengths:
1. I love. WAY too much. I constantly find myself enamoured by friendship, deed, heartbreak, and the human condition.
2. I accept my failures and work from them. I understand that I fail. I understand that I am not always right. But, I don’t care. I will constantly work to remedy those issues so I do not face a similar problem in the future. I hope that by doing this, I do not allow “history to repeat itself”, as it were.
3. I am creative. I write and read. A lot. This weekend, I fit in 400-something pages of book. I learn so much and it makes me a better and more knowledgeable person.
4. I dream big. As I said, I want to perform on Broadway or in the Met. HUGE goals. But, it only makes me work harder. I know I will be the best I can be.
5. I am a pacifist. Going along with 1., I am not a fighter by design. I am a big teddy bear. Some would say this is a weakness, but I see the inherent strengths in acting with compassion. I just have to work on ACTIVELY being compassionate instead of passively doing so.
6. I am Dionysian. I party some. I think it is important in a thinker’s life to loosen up every once and a while. It gives me perspective and keeps me grounded instead of letting my head seep up into the sweeping clouds of rhetoric and language wherein I think. hahaha.
7. I am Apollonian. As well as with Bacchus, I am with Apollo. I am ambitious and ready to overcome my obstacles. I am an achievist, which makes me competitive. Sometimes, though, I can have a negative attitude about my ambition. Oh well, nobody’s perfect.
8. I realize I am not perfect, but I am Perfect. It is so incredibly complicated, but probably the most important strength about me. I do not have perfection (defined: the subjective view of the World that qualifies one to be without fault). I know people that believe that are perfect and without fault because their opinion is the only valid one. I am Perfect (defined: the objective view of every person recognizing their inherent imperfection, yet with an integral belief that individualized Perfection is built by being the BEST person one can be). I see my weaknesses not as flaws but as challenges and hopes to overcome.
9. I am a quick learner. I read FAST and I read well. I do not take in details when I read very quickly, but I do catch a very good gist of the main idea. I tend to soak up audio details quickly and learn very fast. This helps in problem solving. This also helps keep my workload down in my school assignments.
10. Finally, I am good with Time Management. Somehow, I had a BUNCH of free time last semester and came out with a 4.0 after taking 19 credit hours. This just speaks for itself.
How does this fit into the overall plan of your life? Dare to dream:
These strengths are all Jedi-essential. I think they help me recognize where my weaknesses are, and where I can improve. Being a Jedi is a constant pursuit of Greatness (defined: the lust for Knowledge, strength, and clarity). I think I am on the right path. No, I KNOW I am on the right path. So, I don’t dare to think too much about the future; I prefer a Qui-Gon perspective.
butchjax said,
January 17, 2012 at 11:39 AM
Just remember to post this in the forum area.
butchjax said,
January 24, 2012 at 6:20 PM
Since you haven’t copied this into the forum yet, I’ll reply here for now.
First off, you know you’re one of the rare ones who is living their dream, which is always exciting. I think that’s reflected in everything you do because you aren’t secretly unsatisfied with things.
Now to try to challenge you (not that I expect it will challenge you much, but I have to try lol).
You list many things as strengths which others view as weaknesses. Look at your list and now explain why they are strengths rather than weaknesses. Imagine a skeptical but not completely stubborn audience so it isn’t like convincing a brick wall.