At some point in everyone’s life, we ask ourselves “What do I want to do for the rest of my life?”. To answer this question, people analyze their interests, skills, values, beliefs, and what they aspire their purpose to be.
I’m at a stage in my life where I don’t have my career gazes set in one exact direction nor do I have the knowledge to make that decision at this moment in time but if there’s one thing I know for certain is that there are no secrets to success- it takes drive, consistency, self-belief, mental fortitude, and an unwavering obsession with your craft.
“Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.”
– Robert Collier
This quote reminds me of our previous project in PGP, Atomic Habits. Much like our exploration of nationalism and the WWI comics last year, I felt that Atomic Habits was an excellent foundation for our exhibition project on marketing ourselves. James Clear’s lessons on building small, easy but impactful habits directly translated into this project, emphasizing how consistency and intentional actions lead to quality work.
Similar to this, the other day I stumbled upon a video mentioning the inputs and outputs in relation to goals and success. The inputs are the small efforts you put in to achieving the big goal/outcome while the outputs are the results you get out of the accumulated inputs over time perfectly illustrating the simple phrase, “the more you put in, the more you get out”.
We centred this exhibition around the driving question, “How might I present my passions, strengths, and learning to the world?”. A basic few ways we did as a class were through abridged resumes, business cards, discovering the value of forming genuine connections with people (Curt Scheewe lecture), and designing our physical “booths” that are going to capture bits and pieces of our personality and discovering way we might present ourselves to “future employers”.
The BIG IDEA of this project was to…
- Explore ourselves, identify our strengths, weaknesses, and interests to develop potential career options, that will hopefully lead us to a sense of purpose, balance, fulfillment, and control over our own lives.
- Possessing solid communication + social skills are critical factors that employers look for in interviewees.
- Imagine you have a big interview tomorrow for a barista position at Starbucks, your first legitimate job. What are you going to include on your resume, and how will you pitch yourself? What skills and assets do you bring to the table? What values define you, and what relevant experiences can you showcase? These are typical questions you ask yourself when preparing your pitch in hopes of landing that role. The exhibition acted as a simulation of a real-life work environment— more specifically, presenting your personal pitch.
I will continue to ask myself the driving question in the future, I’m sure of it! There will be other opportunities where I will have to answer that question once again, next time stronger!
All in all another successful exhibition, in the spring exhibition, I hope to engage my audience more through engagement elements as I feel the “corn hole” didn’t reach the attention it deserved.
Thanks for stopping by, see y’all in the spring. Peace.