"A Change Would Do You Good"

Forum Date: Monday, November 5, 2012

CHANGE. That word pretty much sums up what occured last Monday and goes along with the rest of my life recently. We were supposed to listen to Elizabeth Moore, a lady who works at the Red Cross, but she was unable to attend due to Hurricane Sandy keeping her on a tight schedule.

Last forum served as sort of a "check-up" on everyone's volunteer hours to date. I'm pretty sure after Vince called on the first "victim" to talk about his or her civic engagement, all the other students tried their best to blend in and become flies on the wall. Although there were a select few who had already completed all their volunteer hours for the semester (props to them), Vince seemed a little worried about the rest. He wants to make sure that we all look for volunteer opportunities that have some connection to us and that we understand the whole point of this whole civic engagement project. Instead of just viewing our 10 hours as another thing on our to-do list, he wants to encourage volunteering that isn't mandatory.

While I think it's definitely important to put an emphasis on the importance of investing in other people besides ourselves, sometimes we need to be a little selfish to maintain a balance. If someone were to overcommit themselves by trying to handle too many things (like school, extracurricular activities, work, family, friends, volunteering, social life, and religion), where does the focus go? It's better to make a few commitments. In my opinion, one of our top priorities, at this point in our lives, should be our future. Point blank. If not that, then why are we even at UNA? It's vital to look at the big picture: If we get good grades in school and learn new things, we can keep our scholarships, graduate, and, hopefully, find a job. When we bite off more we can chew by trying to be involved in everything, however, we push school aside to make more room and things start to crumble.

Right now, I'll admit that I need to work on my planning. Procrastination has always been a skill of mine that also doubles as a curse. I'm trying to overcome that, so that I can manage my life better and have more time to do things like volunteer.