Reflections

1) Details about my values:

I gained a new perspective on my values by actually going through the process of analysing them and figuring out what was actually important to me. To discover that my core values are Honesty, Growth and Love wasn't exactly a secret to myself before hand, but understanding what that means to me, and how it effects who I am on a visceral level was extremely eye opening.

2) Learning Style / Outlook:

I learnt that life had already taught me lessons and shaped me into someone who had a growth mindset and understood neuroplasticity, even though I had never heard of either previously. Learning that these classifications existed, and the plethora of information around them helped me to define things I knew intrinsically, if not consciously. It aided me in understanding my own thought processes as well as revealing areas where I hadn't delved into where I can try and better myself.

3) My Ego is for Me:

Through the entirety of the process of foundations, I have found myself struggle at times, and fly through other parts. This did not effect my ego as the times of each were in the respective areas I already knew I struggled with and am good at. However in both areas my ego did rear it's head, not to say that I'm better or worse than anyone else, but to say that I can do better. I found myself to be my own biggest critic, and that the standard I was continuously trying to reach was my own. This helped me to push and come up with some pretty nice code, however when I was failing to achieve it was quite impactful.

Each of these have roles to play in both learning and programming. Knowing your values, helps you understand your drive. It helps you know why you are doing what you are doing, and can even be an inspiration to keep going, or even a road map on how to get there.

Empathy is vital to this, as you need to be empathetic to those around you. Whether teachers, classmates, employers, co-workers, or even subordinates, everyone deserves to be treated like a human. They deserve to be listened to and feel listened to. They deserve to have a voice, and to feel welcome. With empathy you are able to relate those around you and understand how they're feeling which in turn helps you make sure that you make sure they feel welcome. Positivity breeds productivity, and as such making sure people are happy ensures a good outcome.

Self-awareness is quite possibly the most important role in learning and programming. Self awareness is acknowledging areas you excel, and areas you are weak. Self awareness is knowing when to ask for help, and when to step up. Self awareness is knowing who you are, how you tick, how you learn, how you solve problems, so that you know what to do no matter what situation you are in.

The thing that surprised me the most about learning core, is how applicable it is. There were moments going in where I thought it would be as a friend of mine put it "hippie-dippy", and just be off the wall weirdness that is all about chi and energy etc. However, it wasn't like that at all. It gave me a deeper understanding of myself, and how I function, which has helped me understand how I can better grow, and be a better me.

I am at my core a purely logical person. As such I found the emotive, and intangible aspects of core the most difficult, especially when not provided a concrete scope to stick to. Being confronted with extremely vague instructions, in areas where I'm not all that smart, and no steps to follow to let me know when I was done was extremely trying.

I believe you are incorporating core into the Bootcamp because you are creating programmers. You are not teaching people how to code, you are training programmers. Programming is a way of life, it is a way of thinking, it is a way of approaching problems. And if you know how to code, but you don't know how to do any of the stuff we have learnt in core, it is very easy to get lost in a wall of code and not know what to do. As I believe for myself, If I can't understand myself and why I do the things I do, how can I understand what I need to do in a situation I don't understand?.

Learning core was absolutely not a waste of time. Was it difficult and time consuming? Yes. But the benefits I have already witnessed in my own time so far in foundations. The deeper understanding of myself, and how I think, and how the mind works and all of the other stuff, has helped me problem solve better, it has made it so it is not me "failing" if I need to ask for help or don't know. Meditating in the morning has given me a focus that I had never had before, and a removal of distractive thought. Every piece of core that I have learnt so far, has been used, and has benefited me more than once in my journey so far.