A521.3.4.RB_DellElceCamila

A521.3.4.RB – Personal Reflection

            When I was only 5 years old, while leaving in New York, Queens, I used to belong to a broken home. My parents were always arguing and my mother used to be very physically aggressive with my father. In a matter of months, they were both divorced and my mother left to Bolivia with my sister to start a new life. I stayed with my father for the next six months to later reunite with my mother and move to South American, Bolivia. Unfortunately, there are no books with guidelines on how to be a parent, and parents really do the best they can or at least that is how I see it now. During the following years leaving with my mom were not easy, and in fact brought immense frustrations.

            I remember, I was probably around 7 years old and probably in my second year in elementary school. That year happened to be the one that would forever change my future. “The turning points in life are a fruitful source of stories. These are moments of disruption when some incident gives us a glimpse of the regions of deeper feeling” (Denning, 2011, p. 100). I remember having to do assignments or big important projects for school and not been able to have an adult by my side to guide me through my work. To make things worse, my younger sister had absent parents as well, and the only one she had was me. My dear mother had decided then, that been young again and clubbing all night was more important than us. Therefore, at an early age, I decided to take responsibility for my sister. I was just a child but back then, I thought I was a grown up and I thought I could be the replacement of my mother to my sister’s needs. And that is exactly how the next years of my life turned out to be. I was taking my sister to special events at her school, finding her customs for her recitals, or helping with her homework. All I wanted to do is see her succeed and not feel the emptiness I was feeling.

            In those years to come, looking back, I could easily pin point everything that went wrong. My father used to leave in a different state, so it was very hard to communicate or go to him whenever I needed someone. I grew up thinking very little of myself as my school performance demonstrated my low capacity to keep up with my grades. In the other hand, my sister loved going to school, had all her grades at one hundred percent, and my family was always telling me how lazy I was compared to my sister. Nevertheless, my childhood made me stronger and I always felt as I could handle anything in my own. It made me mature at an early age and made me realize what matter and right from wrong. By then, I was already the leader of my own short life and I knew exactly what I wanted.

            Years later, another situation happen that sharpened my life. We had already moved back to U.S. Florida and I was leaving with my father. In 2005-2006, I was a senior in High School and ready to graduate. I only had five more months until graduation but obviously, due to my previous experiences; I never did well in school.  And it was not until my counselor called me into her office, that my dreams came crashing. She advised me that due to my academic grades and challenges, I was running behind and that if I did not do something about it, I would have to repeat my senior year. Therefore, for the next five moths left of school, I had to be a junior again until I can prove I am ready. It was not until then that I started to ask myself, what do I want out of life? What I am going to do once I graduate? As imaginable, I started to ask myself a billion questions to come to the conclusion that I wanted to go to college and eventually get a professional degree. Those five months were very intense and I really worked hard to catch up with everything. In the end I graduated but the challenging part was not over and little did I know.

            June 2006, I went to Broward College, took my best friend with me and enrolled myself in school. My first two years were a nightmare, as I did not have any background on how to study properly and I had really bad habits. I started to fail some classes and some others I would barely pass. When graduation came alone, I was somehow proud of myself for finishing but my grade point average was very low and not enough to get me to the next level. And when I found myself limited in what schools would let me pursue my Bachelors, I realized the damage I had created and wish I could erase everything and start fresh. But of course, life must go on! Ever since then, I have work so hard into learning new way to study and to try to be the best at what I do. My life path has not been that easy but I managed to get the best out of it.

            Today, I am pursuing a Masters Degree of Science in Leadership and trying to apply to Medical School. I believe I am here because of my past and like it or not, my leadership orientation was tested early in my life. I cannot say, I am the best leader there is out there as I am sure there are very capable individuals. But I can say that I aim for perfection and motivating and helping others is my call or destine as others may call it. The impacts these stories have in myself are priceless. I am not a perfect human being but I never give up, and my little successes come from been stubborn and never giving up. Furthermore, these situations have affected me while in an organizational setting in the sense of always doing the right thing. By that I mean, leading others into following the rules, always playing as team players, and to enjoy what they do to reflect and transmit charisma. And the most important having autonomy and proactivity for themselves while working.

References

Denning, S. (2011). The leader's guide to storytelling: Mastering the art and discipline of business narrative. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass