10V- Word of the Week

http://www.littletikes.com/kids-toys/pink-double-easel

The vocabulary word of the week is creativity.  This word is uniquely important to me because of the fact that I was raised in a house that focused on art and music.  Although I was also focused on school, a big part of my down time was spent at art school. The definition on creativity means the use of your imagination, in my words. Any activity that requires you to think out of your box of comfortability.

 Two other words that came up during this week were, connotations and demographic.  Both words came up while I was reading a book.  The word connotations means an idea or feeling that a word or phrase evokes.  I also had learned about this word in my critical thinking class. When it popped up in reading, I decided to reexamine its meaning.  The word demographic means something that is related tot he structure of populations. Although I do not completely understand this word yet I hope to learn more about it.  

10B- Creating Me

Ever since I was in first grade, I've known what I wanted to be when I grew up. I sat in my room, watching movie after movie.  From watching media I started developing a sense of style.  I began noticing that people give off a certain aura.  This is when I decided that I wanted to be a fashion designer.

Ever since I was little, I wasn't afraid to look different than everyone else.  I wasn't afraid to try new things and push the limit when it came to what I wore.  Some of this came from my brother.  He taught me that it is okay to be out of the box.  On weekends, we would go to New York City. We would sit on a bench for hours at a time and simply look at the people who passed by.  Some people dressed safe, while others pushed their limits. I slowly learned what worked and what did not from my "people-watching" hobby.

Ever since my brother discovered my interest in design, he buys me a fashion book on every occasion he can. Every Birthday and Christmas, I waited to see what new things I could learn about it.  One year I got a book filled with Valentino dresses through out the years.  To this day, this book is still the place I turn when I run out of ideas.  It is my inspiration to continue in this field of work.

My greatest dream is to become a fashion designer.  I want to style for broadway plays.  I would also be interested in designing formal dresses or other avant garde garments. I had once designed my own prom dress, but never executed it.  Maybe one day I'll be able to achieve this goal. 

10A-

I would write my blog critiquing my midterm video, but I was never able to post one.  As many of you might have noticed, I have failed to post many of my blogs recently. Although I am not proud of this and do not excuse it, I have not been in the best place recently.

 Almost every weekend, I have spent at home.  Most people would assume that I would have more free time, but this is not the case.  My weekends were spent packing, and if I was not packing I was thinking about moving. My mom couldn't of picked a more inconvenient time to decide to leave my childhood house.  With college just starting, I have been very homesick. Lately even when I am home, I don't feel like it.  My house no longer smells of incense and home cooked food. It now smells of cardboard boxes.

On top of being preoccupied with house arrangements, I have also been dealing with computer issues.  My computers camera and audio features have completely stopped working. This is why my midterm project did not get finished.  

My problem when facing a difficult situation, is that I freak out and in turn tend to give up more easily.  I give up and become so stressed that nothing can seem to get me out my "phunk." Although it does not excuse what happened, I believe that now that I am more aware of my actions, I can take control of the situation before it is too late. 

This photo shows what is left of one of the rooms in my house.

Video Rough Draft

Although I only have a minute finished, I intend on interviewing my RA and many other influential Greek Life participants. I intend to first show the stereotypes that are made about greek life and then explain how it truly is. I am going to show how people can get involved with this part of southern. This is what I have to start off with:

6V-Keep on Going

http://cloudyco.com/2005/01/the-honorary-title/

Persistence is when you continue on in the direction of your goal, no matter the road blocks or dilemmas that arise.  This was a very prevalent word this week because of my anxiety.  In many ways it hindered me from doing my work and keeping focused on school, but I continued to focus on school.  Although I may not have put in as much effort as I have in previous weeks, I continued to stay fairly caught up with the rest of my work.

A word that came up this week that I did not recognize was damping.  I read it in a definition in one of my textbooks. The definition I found for damping is a decrease in the amplitude of an oscillation as a result of energy being drained from the system to overcome frictional or other resistive forces.  Although I do not completely understand the definition of this word completely, I found it interesting.  It seemed like it might have a simple definition, so when I found out that it wasn't I was surprised.

The second word I did not recognize this week was, honoraries.  This word was not brought up in a class, but in a conversation between a friend and I.  We were talking about the advantages to being involved on campus.  She talked about how she wanted to know the campus honoraries better.  Although you can infer the definition from the context of the word, I wanted to get the exact definition.  As expected it was an elite member of a group of people. 

6I-My Spot

If you had a private studying spot would you want to tell the entire world wide web about it? It would get too crowded. There aren't many positives to telling someone where you get away from everyone else.  But if you are like me, you may not want to be in a place with a pretty view, or somewhere that you are completely alone. My place to study is at Conn Hall.

http://ascribehq.com/larosa-building-group/portfolio/3568

Most people would think that this is a horrible place to study, but for me it is perfect. Any week day there is a good chance that you will find me sitting alone, with homework strewn across the table in front of me from about nine to eleven in the morning.  Most of the time I will be sitting at one of the tall tables behind the booths.  I like these seats better because if I sit in the seat with my back against the rest of Conn, I am able to block out everyone else. I simply put my headphones in and blast whatever music I feel like listening to.  I  do not know how I am able to do this but I am the most productive while in this spot.  

Although this may not be the same spot that works for you, it is always an option. Everyone's studying habits differ, but if you try different things, you will be able to find out what works for you.

6A- The Climb

When it comes to hardships, we all are facing something.  When reading this weeks assignments I had to decide again how much I want to inform everyone.  It became apparent after a few days what I had no choice what to write about.  

Fears.  Everyone is afraid of something. But what happens when that fear is diagnosed as a phobia. The girl who lives across the hall from me texted me and informed me that she had thrown up Monday morning.  My heart sunk at this information. Ever since I was a child, I have had a fear of getting sick in this way.  I had avoided it at all costs.  Anytime someone I knew would get sick, I would avoid contact with anyone for a week if not more.  Someone got sick in my house, did not walk in that part of my house for two years.  Not until this week did I come to the realization that this was not a fear.  It was a phobia.

I am very vigilant with washing my hands and rarely miss taking vitamins.  I always attempt to get the correct amount of sleep and do everything to avoid this.  That Monday, all I could think about was the possibility of ways that I could have been exposed to the bacteria or virus.  This thought process is what lead me into my week from hell. 

Have you ever convinced yourself that you were sick? So much that you also convinced your body that you were.  Every symptom associated with the sickness rushes over your body at once.  Your throat begins to close up, not allowing you to breathe.  Your whole body begins to shake and you feel as if your worst fear is coming true. Have you ever had it happen more than 10 times in one week?

Neither had I.

In the past week, I have had this exact process happen to me multiple times.  Some during classes, some while trying to fall asleep, some in the middle of the night. When talking to my counselor about it she explained to me that I was having a panic attack.  We worked together in order to find things that would possibly work in order to get me through these attacks. Although there is no way for me to know if any of you have suffered similar anxiety related attacks, and I hope that none of you have, I thought I would explain the things that got me through it.

http://www.medicalook.com/Mental_health/Anxiety.html

• Start taking deep breaths.
• Get a glass of water
• Distract yourself with something that you enjoy(ex. music, socializing, watching television, etc.)
• Assure yourself that you will be okay no matter what happens.
• Talk to someone (ex. counselor, family member, friend)
• Think about the things that make you the happiest.

Although I still struggle with anxiety and panic attacks, I am hoping that I will be able to better control them.  It will not be easy, but with the help of the people who care about me, I hope to improve.  This is something that I have been struggling with for many years, and will most likely still be fighting for years to come.  My only option is to not give up.  I know that in order to overcome this, I will need to face it head on and never let it take over my life.