Reflecting Semester One and Starting My Novel

    It has already been 5 days into winter break. I'm feeling the most rested, rejuvenated, and invigorated than I have ever been in quite a while. Rab talked about how he opposes paper tests. It is needless to say that I disrelish them as well, and am in complete agreeance with Rab. There are close to zero skills attained in the process of studying for a paper test needed when we grow up and venture out into the world. The knowledge and facts we obtain only last a few days at its most, and flies right out of my brain as the bell signing the end of the test, rings. If I had to give one beneficial point, I would say tests allow me to understand what I had learned at my own pace in the comfort of my room and have a superior feeling of accomplishment. On the other hand, tasks given in class throughout the semester seem much more meaningful and have all the consequential traits a test lacks. Of course, Rab's tasks push me to my boundaries and stimulating hardships are inherent in each of the steps along the way. Notwithstanding all the opportunities given to me, I am not at all satisfied with myself and the outcome of last semester. As for the projects and tasks we were given, I did everything I could and gave it my all. However, that tingling motivation always seemed to come from other people or getting good grades. I am not against those reasons, because after all those are one of the students' largest motivations. Having said that, the student I aspire to be is someone who commits and devotes themselves to work harder for SELF AMELIORATION. This persona is much more appealing to me.

    In the next semester, I aim to seriously not compare myself with others and not be satisfied by convincing myself I did good enough with superficial results. I feel better just imagining satisfying my own expectations and how that would augment both my self-confidence and the quality of each task. 

    Subsequent to a superlative semester, I am looking forward to reading for pleasure next semester. The book I have settled on is "The Hate U Give" written by Angie Thomas. Black Lives Matter was a topic that blew up and swept social media this year. I've never been so alarmed and woken up regarding such a global and crucial issue. Little did I know there was much information that laid in the dark, unknown by the majority of people. I recall the times where everything relegated to online platforms, yet this movement was existent across the globe and I was very overwhelmed. As I was following every activist on BLM and persistently looking up information on the action, accumulating all the knowledge available, this book had caught my eye an innumerable amount of times. Back then, I was not able to prioritize my reading hobby but now that I have ample time, I am so excited to educate myself on this much-recommended book and simply enjoy reading it. I seek much possibility and hope in novels in general, the world created by words and imaginable characters absolutely suck me in. They often clearly show various juxtapositions that I am not able to spot in real life where too much complexity permeates the world. Hearing that this novel provides diverse concepts and contains powerful messages, I was so tempted to give it a try. Since we were constantly researching multitudinous aspects of the novel, last semester, I have to literally stop my temptation to do so for this book and really be present and enjoy this novel which was quite mind-blowing! 

The book has not arrived yet, but my next blog will most likely be a short summary, and my first thoughts on it!