Skip to main content

Dear, Johnnie!

 


What's up, Week 6! We are quickly making it through the Summer, and I can't believe we are in week 6. This week I've had the opportunity to be back home in Indiana! A trip that was needed and right on time, as the Summer term has been just as busy or even busier than the Spring semester? I am still deciding which one has moved quicker. However, week 6 had a tool that perfectly fits where I am presently in my life. Futureme, I have never heard of it before this week, but I am happy I know now about Futureme. For those who have yet to explore Futureme, I highly recommend doing so because Futureme offers the opportunity to write a letter to yourself! I love activities and moments to self-reflect, journal, process, and read words of affirmation. Lately, I have been feeling overwhelmed by everything I have my hands in, whether in my personal life (adulting..." yay!" ), my own academics and coursework, teaching, research projects,  and just navigating life in general. In addition to enjoying this course, it comes with its challenges of constantly being on digital and social media platforms. I noticed more now than ever that the breaks and pauses are necessary. Therefore, I wrote a letter to myself that I will get 6 months from now because I want to look back at this moment, at the end of the year, and celebrate how far I have come. Celebrating the highs and lows because it is all a part of my journey, and I am coming to understand that with grace, love, community, and motivation, you will get to the end and smile about the journey. I am practicing being more intentional with taking time for myself because I give so much to others, and I know I must do the same. I am glad to have had this moment to pause and reflect. I will definitely use Futureme in some of the leadership courses I teach as a way to get my students to do some reflecting and processing, and the letter can be a "Dear Future Leader" letter about how they hope to see themselves engaging in the leadership process throughout their journey (Beatty & Guthrie, 2021).  

Utilizing Futureme this week allowed me to pause and reflect as I have been more intentional with doing this as I started at the beginning of May. Sometimes it takes sending yourself a love letter to show you are doing everything you should. 

How do you practice self-love? How do you practice pausing and reflecting? What is your form of self-care? 

References: 

Beatty, C. & Guthrie, K. (Eds). (2021). Operationalizing culturally relevant leadership learning. Information Age Publishing.  







Comments

  1. DaeunJune 26, 2023 at 9:05 PM

    Wow, it seems like Futureme was introduced to you just at the right timing. Thank you for sharing. I think using it in your leadership courses sounds like a brilliant idea!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. J.AllenJr.July 2, 2023 at 7:07 PM

      Thank you, Daeun! I think I will incorporate it into either my Black Male Leadership course I teach in the fall or Leadership and Change which I teach in the spring.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Reflections on Slack

  I remember the first time I learned about Slack; it was my first year as a Graduate Supervisor in Residential Life at Indiana University. I worked alongside my direct supervisor in co-supervising an undergraduate staff of nine resident assistants (RA's). At the time of staff training, we decided on a platform that could serve as mass communication for the team. We agreed on Slack because there was the option to have multiple channels to engage in different topics. However, this felt far more complicated than a GroupMe chat. After a few failed attempts with Slack, we decided to move forward and not use it as our primary communication forum. I had mixed feelings about Slack. I did not understand any of the other features, so I did not feel I would return to using Slack. We were introduced to Slack in our week 9 module, and I considered giving Slack another try. I checked Slack's website to see if there were any changes, but I did not see any new features or changes. I chose to ...
Post a Comment
Read more

"New Look, Who Dis" Blog Makeover

What a perfect challenge to engage in! It is time for a CHANGE. Change is good. Change is scary. Change is important. I was curious to know how I wanted my blogger site to look when we were tasked with creating our blogger account. I went with something that felt "safe" or comfortable to my liking. I wanted to represent myself, given the headshot. I added something representing my fraternity, and then the overall color with the orange sunset vibe felt like something I would enjoy. I went with some standard or default choices regarding my fonts, backgrounds, and gadgets. The options were endless; I was correct! My blogger design worked for me, and I did not feel like it was something I would grow to hate or dislike. Due to the blog makeover challenge, I am open to embracing this new change! I changed parts of the layout; I chose a different color and switched some fonts to provide a more contemporary feel, look, and vibe. Any suggestions? Thoughts?   I am willing to continue t...
2 comments
Read more

Keeping up With Technology—Digital Natives vs. Digital Immigrants

       Before this week's readings, I only partially thought about generational differences when it comes to technology. Yes, I know there have been distinct differences between how I grew up as a child compared to my parents and now my nieces and nephew with using technology. I did not always have the latest technology growing up, but when I did, it felt like I "had" to have it to stay connected to what my peers were experiencing. My nieces and nephew are now growing up with all types of technology (tablets, school laptops, YouTube, TikTok, etc.) because it is so prevalent in their experiences and upbringing. While reflecting on the readings, the part that shocked me the most would have to be the terms digital natives and digital immigrants (Prensky, 2001). I knew that these specific "identities" regarding technology usage existed, but I did not know there was a term that classified it all together until the Prensky (2001) article. As described in the article, ...
Post a Comment
Read more