Brooks

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Michael Brooks
Professor Byrd
Honors Colloquium 1700-H03
17 November 2015
Final Reflection

Ive always known that growth is inevitable. Its an action that occurs gradually
and is realized suddenly with surprise and shock. Physical growth can be tracked and
monitored, whether by regular doctors visits and check ups or by tick-marks on the wall
of your childhood home. But personal growth is different. Its slower yet somehow more
visible in the way that we act and portray ourselves to the world. In a way, I see my
personal growth as very similar to a home. It has grown and changed and been updated
while still keeping its character. Rooms have been converted from a study to a bedroom
and back again. My childhood bedroom has changed to a teenagers personal space and
then an escape and retreat from the stresses of work and school. And although things are
constantly changing, Im always striving to be the best that I can be while staying true to
my character. Personal growth, like a home, is made up of many facets or rooms. Each
aspect of myself can be seen as a vital room in my home. My personality is my master
suite, my views are my study, my morals are my kitchen, my academic performance is
my living room, and my emotional health is my foundation.
Growing up, my bedroom was the place that I could call my own. I could choose
the decorations and the lay out and I could make it representative of myself. It was, and
still is, the perfect reflection of my personality, though it has changed many times over

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the years as my personality has changed and morphed also. The first artifact that I chose
for my portfolio is a creative writing piece that I did for a workshop roughly a year ago. I
was a member of the English Learning Community here on campus and we were required
to go to events. One that caught my attention right away was the creative writing
workshop. I have always loved to write short, fantasy-fiction stories, so I figured I would
go to an event that I knew I would enjoy. However, as I read over the piece that I was so
proud of and so interested in a year ago, I found so many things that I want to change.
Not because I did them incorrectly, but because I feel like I can improve and expand on
them.
I have a unique experience available to me as a new sophomore in the honors
program because Im not seeing the same changes over the year that a freshman would.
Im seeing more gradual changes that reveal themselves to me in a much slower way than
the realizations of being away at a university for the first time. The changes that I would
make to my story are the representation of this growth. I have realized that I have a
deeper appreciation of the subtleties that come with every day life. Ive become much
calmer and this shows in how I work as well as in my views, which I regard as the study
in my cognitive home.
The most current assignment that I have completed that represents my views on a
multitude of topics is the Altered Book. Its almost as if I can show the dcor of my study
to my peers due to the creative and symbolic nature of this recent assignment. Although I
did have to take a step back and really think about how I felt about each topic, I dont
believe that I had the same internal struggle and decision making process that some of my
peers did. Coming to study at a university can have major affects on how a person feels

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about things like politics, gender equality, religion, and the concept of citizenship. Youre
surrounded by a multitude of different opinions and cultures and youre given the option
to pick and choose what works for you like a buffet. During the first semester of my
freshman year I experienced the overwhelming self-discovery process, but Ive stabilized
a lot since then. I am more confident in who I am and what I believe and I now focus on
the expansion of my beliefs to include new information, similar to the expansion of a
study by continuously filling the shelves with new books.
Throughout the semester, weve discussed different peoples definition of a
scholar citizen. My definition includes a yearning to learn that exceeds all others with the
exception of basic physical needs. It doesnt matter to me what profession you are in or
whether or not you attend a university; if you want to continue learning in anyway that
you can, you are a scholar citizen. Unfortunately I didnt always include everyone in this
definition. For a long time I only included students because thats what I was. My peers
were all students, so I assumed that we were the ones that the question was about. But as
I continued to fill my study with new information, my perception shifted and it began to
include people of all ages, from all cultures, and from all walks of life. Anyone can be a
scholar citizen if they value education and the effect that it has on not only themselves,
but on communities as a whole.
This semester has been quite a challenge for me. My patience and my academic
performance have been challenged in a way that I am not used to. I personally dont
believe that the challenge came from the difficulty of the class, but the teaching style of
the professor. Before this semester, I believed that if I worked hard enough and believed
in my abilities enough that I would always make the grade that I wanted. However, the

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living room of my home, what I compare to my academic performance, was being
poorly taken care of. I was working myself to the bone trying to balance everything and
make the grade that I wanted for myself, but I was doing it in a way that was bad for my
mental health. I was so focused on decorating the living room that I was neglecting the
cleanliness of it. After multiple breakdowns and just coming to terms with the fact that no
matter how hard I tried, I would not be able to get the grade I wanted, I found that I was
stronger than I thought. The foundation (my emotions) of my house is unbreakable. It still
upsets me that I wont receive the grade I know I deserve, but I can now say that I did my
assignments to the best of my abilities and I am proud of myself and my abilities. And the
best result of this experience is that I now have better study habits.
The heart of every home happens to be the kitchen. Food is a central connecting
point of every culture, so I consider the kitchen the equivalent of a moral set of values. It
is the central force in my thinking and the major hub in my home. Im currently taking
the Honors section of LBST 2101, also known as Honors Western History and Culture,
and in this class we discuss what it means to live a good life in many cultures around
the world. The information that I am exposed to and the discussions that I am involved in
have made me question some of the values that were bestowed on me as a child. Things
like nationalism and organized religion have no longer seemed like such a necessity to a
proper adult life. Although I have come to some realizations about myself, renovating
my kitchen so to speak, within the past year, I am still expanding my morals. The inquiry
and research that I have experienced not only this semester in Professor Sinclairs class,
but also over the past year are an indicator that I am not a completed home.

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I may have undergone lengthy and extravagant renovations over the past couple
of years as I journey through self-discovery, but its far from over. As a sophomore, I
firmly believe that I have a unique experience that the majority of my peers will be
unable to relate to for another year. I have calmed and begun to experience much slower
and subtler changes that seem to reveal themselves in a way that make them seem as
though they were always there. They appear in the way that I carry myself and the way
that I present myself to my peers, my family, and the world in general. Ive grown over
the past year in a way that is similar to others my age but also uniquely my own. My
cognitive home is perfect for me as I am now, and it will continue to grow with me.