The End/Beginning: ELPers, seek your passions

(EDIT: I'm staying on Blogger! Read my posts as they continue here throughout the coming weeks and months.)

One of my passions is having an outdoorsy lifestyle that embodies the spirit of my home, my lifeblood, the Pacific Northwest. Pictured here is Grand Tetons National Park in autumn. What are your passions? How can you attain them?

How can it be over already? It seems like it was just yesterday that I nervously walked over to the Locatelli Center for that first class in January. I didn't know what to expect, or really why I had signed up in the first place. I wanted to connect with a group of people that I wasn't finding in the Fall Quarter and wow, have I found that much and more.

I could not have asked for a better experience for the Winter Quarter of my freshman year here at Santa Clara University. Combined with numerous other experiences (namely, the DISCOVER Retreat with Campus Ministry, CLC, and a few other great programs), ELP has been absolutely essential to my  development as a student, as a leader, and as a person. Honestly, I've learned more, I think, about myself than I ever could have expected. And, quite honestly, it's helped me to make it through.

Toward the middle of the quarter, I was seriously struggling with being away from my home in the Pacific Northwest, as I was feeling increasingly disconnected by the day. Meanwhile, I still didn't really feel like I fit in, that I could be myself, here at Santa Clara. This, combined with my apparent lack of a career/major direction, contributed to what I would term a serious mental/emotional breakdown. Where did I fit in? 

As it turns out, I discovered by the end of the quarter that I fit in here. And I don't have to abandon my past, my values, my experience, my home, in order to have an amazing university experience. I belong here. Among my fellow ELPers. Among these great leaders, these awesome, hilarious people who don't mind me being me. Among this awesome group of people that explores their passions each and every day. I couldn't have asked for a better group of people with whom to share this experience; so thank you.

I learned about how my own personality can influence my leadership styles--and how different peoples' personalities necessitate varying styles of leadership so as to better communicate goals and values. I learned that my values many times also influence how I lead. I'm very passionate about everything to do, and unsurprisingly I'm thus extremely passionate in my leadership style. But some people may not respond well to that style, so I need to know when and how to tone it down so as to create the best platform for collaboration. I learned that the struggles of one person can quickly become the struggles of the group if they aren't dealt with and vocalized in a strong, empathetic way. We work the best together when we recognize each other's strengths and weaknesses and build from them.

Most of all, I'd say that I learned that we work the best together, create the best products, organize the best events, craft the coolest retreat ideas, when we are passionate, when we care deeply about, when we love our work. Passion is everything. Where would we be if we hadn't explored our passions, our desires, our greatest loves? And where would we be if we hadn't persevered in the search? As an undeclared student who has gone through many different thoughts as to a possible major, this class, combined with DISCOVER, has helped me to realize that what I choose to study doesn't matter nearly as much as what I choose to do with my studies. More than that, I learned that I should chase my passions before all else--because by doing so, we are best able to lead, organize, grow, and create. Here, I'm guided by the words of Pedro Arrupe, S.J., the former superior general of the Society of Jesus:

Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, than falling in love in a quite absolute final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will effect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you do with your evenings, how you spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.

It's not so much about "finding God" as it is about "finding passions." Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything. It describes that moment when our worries and fears fade away and the only thing in front of us is our "here and now." It describes how I have felt about ELP these past few weeks.

Anyway, I hope to continue my leadership development. Most significantly, I need to continue with weekly self-reflection. I find it as an opportunity to air my concerns and center myself as I head into the new week, and it has been one of my favorite experience of ELP. So this blog will continue--although it will be, following this post, jumping here, over to Wordpress. All of these posts from ELP will remain archived here and a copy will exist there as well. Tumblr allows greater flexibility for posting mixed media and I can hashtag things. Which I like.

Seriously, though, my development as a leader--and as a person--is absolutely essential to me. And by reflecting as I go, I find that I'm better able to recognize where I succeed and where I fail as a leader; that way I can work to improve. As I grow into leadership positions, I expect to use the knowledge I gained in ELP about how different types of people work and lead in order to create environments that are inviting for all to, first and foremost, seek their passions.