6. Communication

As I read the text and reflected on the listening self-evaluation, I had the realization that communication, while being regularly engaged in, is not something we normally think about. So in response to the question of my communication style, after mulling over it, I came to the conclusion that a singular communication style was not possible for me to settle on. Therefore, I am a self-proclaimed unassertive/assertive communicator. While my communication almost never falls into the aggressive style and mostly stays within the assertive area, there are times where I find myself being unassertive. For example, if someone asks me to take a shift at work I only feel comfortable saying no if there is a definite reason for me to do so. Otherwise, I remain avoidant of them, say yes when I really don’t want to work for them, and am completely uncomfortable until I tell them no.

As far as listening communication goes, I scored above average in listening; however, I am aware that this is a self-evaluation and I may be biased. While I scored myself highly in most areas, there were a few distinct points where I saw a need of improvement in. One of these is something I began to recognize earlier this year and this is my poor habit of interrupting. I get so excited with a thought that I feel the need to jump in with my idea! However, this is an area I am going to work on improving by being aware of the issue. Another listening area I am weak in is that I tend to give advice when someone confides in me, whether it was asked for or not. In the future I plan on holding back in this area or at least asking if they want my advice.

Unintentionally related to communication is the ethical dilemma I encountered. While counseling at a Bible camp one summer, a co-counselor and friend of mine had a camper who told her something in confidence. The secret ended up being about a terrible situation of abuse that this young person had endured; my friend was left wondering whether she needed to report this situation or whether she should keep it a secret, given that she had been told on the condition that she never tell anyone. My friend eventually decided along the lines of care-based thinking, where she reported the situation, although it the girl may not have wanted her to at the time, because it was for her greatest good and was something my friend would have wanted done for her if she in that situation.

5. Ethnicity

While gender and race play nominal roles in my leadership development and values, ethnicity plays a slightly greater role and the harder and longer I look, the more I realize its impact. In my previous blog, I stated that my foundational values were: faith, hard work, generosity, compassion, and humility; when I look at where I was raised and my ethnicity, I realize how much influence these have on my values. For starters, my mother is full-blooded Norwegian and my dad is full-blooded German. Both were born and raised in small towns of rural Minnesota- my dad in central Minnesota and my mom in western Minnesota. They raised me and my siblings in a small town in Northern Minnesota. Both my hometown and the communities where they were raised value hard work. It was expected in their rural sub-cultures and now my sub-culture that you work to earn what own.

As far as other values go, something that comes from living in small towns is the generosity and compassion. Since you know the situations of many individuals and families living around you, many lend helping hands when someone is in a rough time of life.

Faith plays a huge role in the ethnicities and traditions of my parents. My dad grew up in a primarily German community and was therefore, unsurprisingly, raised Catholic. It was part of every dynamic of life for him growing up. My mom, raised in a primarily Scandinavian community was raised Lutheran, which is also not surprising.

As far as leadership goes, I don’t think my ethnicity plays much of a role. While I may, unfortunately, have more opportunities for leadership because of being a middle-class Caucasian woman, I do think this influences the way I lead; I try to follow the examples of solid leaders who have gone before me.

4. Values

As I sat down to think over who has influenced my values, I realized I first had to identify what those values are; which is something I do not frequently consider. So after some thought, I compiled this short list:

·         Faith

·         Hard work

·         Compassion

·         Humility

·         Generosity

While this is obviously not a complete list of everything I value, these are definitely foundational truths to my life.  The biggest influence to these values was and is my family. While this may come as no surprise to most since the family is a primary tool for socialization, it kind of surprised me- mostly because I had not thought about it before.

Faith is truly a product of my upbringing. My parents are wonderful Christians who love God and love me. They installed many of the beliefs about following Christ that I hold to this day. While my faith is now my own, it is still something which came from my parents.

When I think of nearly every individual within my family, hard work is prominent descriptor. Both of my parents and most of my siblings have worked so hard to get to where they are in life now.  I have learned the value of earning what you get and loving what you do. Along with hard work in my family comes generosity. My parents are giving people- especially to their kids, but it is expected that we will work hard for it. For example, my parents help pay for some of my college tuition; however, it is expected that I will work to earn the remainder of what they don’t pay for.

Finally, compassion and humility were instilled in me by my mother especially. First, to love and help those who need it and second, to do so without ever thinking I am better than them. My mother’s favorite saying is, “Pride comes before the fall!” and it is something she quotes often, especially when she thinks one of her children or my dad are getting a little too prideful about what we have accomplished.

3. Being left out

It is true that at some moment in life, every person has experienced being an “outsider.” For me, this happened in 7^th grade; I was homeschooled throughout elementary but decided to go to public school for a few classes in 7^th grade. I was in volleyball so I had made friends through that before school started and once school year began I quickly made friends with nearly everyone. I did have one specific group of girls whom I ate lunch with every day, but I wasn’t really part of their group. I learned my lesson that year that by being friends with everyone, you really aren’t friends with anyone. I didn’t have a group to hang out with on the weekends because everyone already had their set groups that they spent time with. As the year progressed I realized I wanted to become better friends with my lunch crew but they were a very tight-knit bunch with a charismatic leader and they weren’t really looking for another member to their group. I would hang out with them in school a lot but when it came to being outside of school, I was never invited.

This began to change slowly at the end of 7^th grade as some of the girls in the group began to hang out with me more in school but the most progress was made in 8^th grade when the group fell apart and suddenly all of them wanted to be friends with me. I guess in their minds being friends with me was better than being alone so my popularity greatly increased. In fact, I soon became best friends with that charismatic leader and we have remained best friends to this very day (so this angst-y teenage drama does have a happy ending!) However, it would have been a happier story if my best friend today would have been more welcoming at the time by inviting me to events or if one of the other girls in the group would have had the guts to invite me over to develop the friendship more.