"Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act."

As mentioned above, my first 3 goals were written without knowing what to expect from the course. I knew I had to learn the Japanese characters quickly, so I could start learning the vocabulary. I have achieved this goal and I am very glad I have set it. Because even when you don’t know what a word means, being able to read it is a big help. Prioritising this has meant that now I can focus on other things that I struggle with at school.

I have never been much of a planner at school. In secondary school I had to join some classes to help me make schedules for myself. To avoid stressing myself out at the course, I had set the goal to use my planner actively until the end of the semester. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to achieve this goal. The time at school flew by and before I knew it, school holidays had started. This is a goal I really want to try and achieve again. Because I am convinced that if I made it a habit, it could benefit me a lot.

The third goal I had set shortly after I had my first few ICC classes. Cultural differences had always been a huge interest for me so I was super excited for the classes. I figured that trying to apply the class material to my personal life would help me understand it more. This was quite an easy goal to achieve yet really interesting and fun. It’s when I found out that culture influences us more than I previously thought, and this really helped me throughout the rest of ICC.

During the second block I was required to make the Global Mind Monitor as part of my Cultural Self Portrait. In the GMM I found that I had 3 points that needed a bit of work. The scores weren’t very low thankfully, yet I did find it important to try and improve them. The three points were:

- Cultural empathy

- Emotional stability

- Flexibility 

I didn’t see much improvement at first seeing as the scores weren’t very low. But over time I noticed some things and habits that could use some improvement. The only unfortunate thing with this goal is that I still can’t see a lot of progress but I am glad I made myself more aware of it.

In the first semester I failed the communication theory exam. I struggled with the material and applying it to the exam questions. So I tried to make it a priority in the second semester to make sure I pass the exam. The exam questions are multiple choice which makes it quite difficult sometimes. There were questions wherein I felt that multiple answers could be correct. I did end up passing the second exam and achieving my goal, which felt amazing and was definitely something I strived for again in the third semester.

During the first group project I took a bit of a back seat. I did the work that was asked of me and tried to come up with ideas, but I didn’t have a specific role. During the second semester, I really wanted to challenge myself. So, I decided to volunteer to be team leader. The role was definitely out of my comfort zone and I felt a lot of pressure. Neither me or my team really understood the project which made it insanely difficult. However, even though the project did not go very well, I did achieve my goal to be more involved and it definitely motivated me to be more involved in the future.