Impact of Reflection

 My first recollection of intentional reflection is when my dad bought me a diary in 2011. It was one of those fancy elastic-bound journals with a ribbon in the middle to serve as a bookmark. From that point, I began writing in it, though occasionally.

When I began writing, my entries included scattered ideas, doodles, and one or two line summary of my day. I surmise that it didn’t greatly interest me in writing at first, and I feel that most of my writings were the consequence of sudden bursts in motivation that gave me an urge to write something down.

I suppose this hands-off, uninterested approach to journaling for pleasure persisted until I entered high school. I recall writing in my journal in freshman year of high school, as I was waiting for my nebulizer medicine to finish (the nebulizer was fairly limiting, as there was not a whole lot I could do for the 10-15 minute time that the medicine was being administered through the facepiece). In my writings, I wrote down the state of my mind, how I was feeling, and things such as my upcoming tests/exams.

Around this same time, I was generally aware of the idea of looming responsibility that would emerge in upcoming years as I matured further, and was fairly uncertain of what to expect of my future within the next 2-3 years. Journaling tied into this because I used to write down my vague notions regarding the person I wanted to be. Thus, I feel that journaling shaped my expectations of my future self and captured my fears and uncertainties regarding which direction my future life would take me. In particular, I had a fear of turning into someone who neglected their duties or, without knowing it, became irresponsible and incompetent. This fear persisted through the next couple of years, and I remember preparing the line “My biggest fear is complacency.” as part of an interview preparation for an internship.

The first major turning point in my experience with reflection came in June of 2018, when I began intentional daily journaling. When I started, my goal was to write down a daily summary of my day, as well as how satisfied and happy I felt. I suppose this reflected a desire to improve myself as well as embark on a journey toward continuous self improvement. I began to set daily goals for myself, and occasionally, when the mood struck, wrote about the day’s events and my feelings in more detail. At the time of writing this, I still maintain this pattern of daily reflection.

A second transformation in my experience with writing and reflection was in the summer following my junior year, when I began to write blog posts regularly: every day or every couple of days. I would write about topics that interested me, typically pertaining to my lifestyle, habits, and interesting thoughts (such as the absurdity of the letter w). My pattern of regular reflection continued over the next few months in the form of college essay drafts, not so much out of interest as out of not compulsion, and a strong desire to represent myself as genuinely as possible.

As of my modern self, which I consider the person who I have come to be in the past few months), I have taken a great interest in podcasts, audio journaling, and listening to public speakers like Jordan Peterson, whose ideas I find captivating at times, and which have influenced many of the topics upon which I have begun to think. Yesterday (as of the time of writing this), I received a gift which I was really excited by--a handheld digital audio recording device that could hold my thoughts. I feel that in talking to others, I often have interesting ideas, and am excited to see what future thoughts that device would hold.