Semester takeaway

3 things I took away from Seeing Sideways

1. A greater understanding of how I think compared to how other people think.

We did a lot of sharing in Seeing Sideways. By doing so, I learned that many of the traits, fears, and thoughts that I believed to be unique to me are shared by many. By the same token, some traits I thought were common now seem less so. I feel like this has given me a greater sense of understanding myself, other people, and the complicated, if subtle, exchanges that happen in human relationships.

2. The importance of starting small.

Many of my projects in this class would never had been finished if I hadn't started somewhere. In particular, doodling, which seemed silly at first, made me realize that by doing something small and seemingly insignificant, you could have a dramatic change in the way you think. It freed my mind up from worrying about the final picture and allowed me to start with the beginning. Likewise, sometimes the smallest phrases said by someone can have drastically different meanings to different people.

3. An increased confidence in what I'm doing.

It is readily apparent that nobody trusts we PR folk. Things to this nature were expressed numerous times over the course of the semester by the majority of the class. It is also something I see every time I tell someone my major and get *that* face. That said, communications in the modern world is a chaotic beast of a mess, and someone has to make sense of it. Because a few of my peers cut corners or use subversive measures in lieu of earning any kind of real understanding of their public, it gives the rest of us a bad name. I intend to expand the way people think in a way that makes my job harder.