{"id":9,"date":"2016-04-13T03:33:01","date_gmt":"2016-04-13T03:33:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/?p=9"},"modified":"2016-04-13T03:33:01","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T03:33:01","slug":"values-and-vocation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/2016\/04\/13\/values-and-vocation\/","title":{"rendered":"Values and Vocation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Instilling values<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was very fortunate in more ways than one growing up. Both my parents always made plenty of time for me and went out of their way to ensure that my childhood was both enjoyable and impactful. Not only do I have a multitude of fond memories from growing up, but more importantly I feel I left their household with both a strong sense of ethics and duty. While they both obviously impacted me in more ways than I could possibly put down in a blog, I will try to briefly describe the shared experiences I have with them that have led me to this fellowship. <\/span><\/p>\n

Discipline and Duty from Dad<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Getting

Getting coached by my dad taught me the value of unselfish effort.<\/p><\/div>\n

From a very early age, I wanted to be just like my dad. One of the clearest things I can remember from my childhood is the sense of pure joy when I would go outside and shoot hoops with him from an early age. Basketball was our most cherished shared activity. As I grew older, our relationship would bloom from father-son to the more complex relationship of father\/coach-son\/player. Though there were undoubtedly times that this made us want to kill each other, I know my dad always had my best interests in mind. In fact, I think having him as a coach shaped two huge parts of my personality due to\u00a0the way things he taught me about the game could be applied to my life.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The first lesson was to never sell myself short effort-wise. For me, there is no worse feeling than walking off the court (or away from a test, or leaving the library) and feeling like I didn\u2019t give everything I have. One thing I remember that used to particularly bother me – and my dad would get on me about after practices\u00a0– would be the rare occasions that I would lose sprints in line drills. We both knew that I was always the fastest on the team and to lose meant to have failed myself. The only thing worse than this would have been\u00a0to fail my team. <\/span><\/p>\n

The second takeaway from getting coached by my dad was to never be selfish. My father drilled it into me that the most important thing was to make sure the team succeeded from an early age. Doing the little things like diving on the ground for a loose ball or making sure to play good defense would always matter more in his eyes than scoring a lot of points. This philosophy has carried over into the rest of my life, where have I always cared more for communal and group success than personal glory.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Nature and Nurture from Mom<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"My

My mom gifted me my love for nature.<\/p><\/div>\n

While my dad gave me lessons on the court, my mom developed my relationship with\u00a0nature. Some of my earliest memories come from spending time in the forest or at the beach with my mom. During summers, she would insist that we turn\u00a0our cable so that I would spend time outside, developing my imagination, along with a deep spiritual connection to the natural world. To this day, being in the water is where I feel spiritually at home, whether I\u2019m kayaking or swimming. This isn\u2019t the only way my mom helped me develop spiritually. I also believe she gave me my deep sense of compassion. <\/span><\/p>\n

My mother ensured\u00a0that I was raised to value the feelings of others. She enrolled me in an alternative pre-school, which emphasized developing both emotional intelligence and a relationship with nature more than a traditional education might have. She taught me to detest violence, even banning me from pointing my finger like a gun in the house. In order to preserve my innocence, she never allowed me to watch the news when I was young because she didn\u2019t want my mind poisoned by all the inexplicable evils the world has to offer, which today\u2019s media seems to have such a fondness for focusing on. <\/span><\/p>\n

From Values to Vocation<\/strong><\/p>\n

I began studying economics with a push from a mentor in high school. Growing up, I had always been very politically inclined due to the values I mentioned in previous paragraphs. I wanted to save the world, but the more I studied politics, the more I felt as though the system was rigged. It seemed like no matter who \u201cwon\u201d an election, the common people always lost and grew apart. As I became more aware of the greed and corruption in the American political system, I became disillusioned, wondering if the things I had learned about the ideals of America had become too polluted to save or even if they had been there to begin with. I began to realize this at the worst time, as college was approaching and applications constantly asked me for stories about my \u201ccalling\u201d or at least made me fill out a box to state my desired major. Luckily, my senior english teacher, Mr. Hill threw me an olive branch. <\/span><\/p>\n

Towards the end of my senior year the entire english class seemed to revolve around how the economic system was rigged. Money seemed to be getting sucked upwards at an alarming rate. I took an interest in the coursework in a way I never had before, and the next thing I knew, I was considering becoming an economist. So, I packed my things up and went to the SCU with grand dreams of saving the American Dream and middle class. I had no idea how I was going to do it, but it felt nice to have a purpose again. <\/span><\/p>\n

I stayed on this path my freshman and sophomore year at SCU, but my experience with Global Fellows the past summer changed that for me. I was lucky enough to intern at the Indonesian Institute for Energy Economics in Jakarta, Indonesia as my summer job and had my eyes opened in a number of ways\u00a0by the experience. Firstly, I fell in love with the culture. Indonesians have a reputation of being both humble and hospitable and they did not disappoint. It felt like everybody on the street wanted to say hello to me and people I got to know personally made\u00a0it their responsibility that I felt comfortable in their country. This was without a doubt the most humbling experience of my life and enlightened me to\u00a0how enriching experiences learning from other cultures are. While this was impactful, perhaps even more life-changing was the fact that my time in Indonesia made me face crippling poverty and pollution for the first time.<\/span><\/p>\n

Unlike when I had seen images of poverty in the developing world on television or the internet in the past, there was no looking away. \u00a0I was forced to question both myself and the systems I participate in passively on a daily basis that contribute global suffering. \u00a0And once I looked long enough, I knew I couldn\u2019t turn away again. This experience put the Global Social Benefit Fellowship in the back of my mind going forward. My study abroad experience in Argentina would only cement that I had to participate in this fellowship.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"My

My Indonesian coworkers welcomed me with open arms.<\/p><\/div>\n

Traveling to Argentina catalyzed personal growth for me, along with frustrating me to no end. On one hand, it pushed my out of my comfort zone in ways Indonesia couldn\u2019t. I blossomed in Argentina, overcoming many of my fears and anxiety whilst becoming more adventurous. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"I

I faced many of my fears whilst abroad, even conquering my lifelong fear of heights!<\/p><\/div>\n

Being able to speak the language and interact with Argentines and their culture allowed me to gain perspective in ways that I couldn’t in Indonesia due to the language barrier. My time in Argentina\u00a0especially made me question the American culture of living fast and focusing on consumerism. Argentines seemed to be more in touch with their feelings and more oriented towards a high quality of life than how productive they could be economically when compared to Americans. Still, there were some things that seemed backwards to me. People seemed to see rampant poverty as a fact of life rather than a problem to be solved in spite of the country’s\u00a0abundance of resources. While some of this could be chalked up to political apathy, it was still hard to stomach. <\/span><\/p>\n

These experiences abroad shaped where I\u2019m going vocationally. The values my mom and dad instilled in me from an early age make it impossible to stay on the sidelines and watch the global issues I\u2019ve observed worsen. If I am not part of the solution, I am part of the problem- whether it is the suffering of the poor or the damage we are doing to our planet. I have high hopes that this fellowship will continue to steer me in this direction, as well as developing my understanding of how\u00a0I can assist in alleviating such complex problems.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Instilling values I was very fortunate in more ways than one growing up. Both my parents always made plenty of time for me and went out of their way to ensure that my childhood was both enjoyable and impactful. Not … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1583,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"qubely_global_settings":"","qubely_interactions":"","kk_blocks_editor_width":"","_kiokenblocks_attr":"","_kiokenblocks_dimensions":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"gutentor_comment":1,"qubely_featured_image_url":null,"qubely_author":{"display_name":"cwhisler","author_link":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/author\/cwhisler\/"},"qubely_comment":1,"qubely_category":"Uncategorized<\/a>","qubely_excerpt":"Instilling values I was very fortunate in more ways than one growing up. Both my parents always made plenty of time for me and went out of their way to ensure that my childhood was both enjoyable and impactful. Not … Continue reading →","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1583"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions\/17"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.scu.edu\/cwhisler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}