My LiA made lots of progress this week. With interviews underway and the majority of the case written, I was able to begin focusing on the design and begin creating diagrams and infographics. It was really fun to be so creative! With the focus being on the student-facing aspects of my research this week, I really began to see the value in what I will produce across my time here. There are so many important public-health lessons learnt from the case I have been researching, and I hope my final product will effectively convey the weeks of research I’ve done to someone who is completely unfamiliar with the case and needs to be taught it in 2 hours!
Each day had tasks to be done every minute of the day, for which I was grateful. I noted how it was much easier to be settled and in the flow of things when my brain did not have time to worry about what still needed to be done/the uncertainties of the project. Looking back, I see now how important it is that I keep tabs on my reaction to this uncertainty — whilst I am leading the project here, it is in some ways a one-man team so my unsettled emotions did not have ripple effects. However, in the future I imagine I will be leading a team of people, with much larger repercussions if I am affected by this inevitable uncertainty and project challenges in the future.
I also see that being so worried and focused on the uncertain aspects of my project actually hindered the tangible progress I could make. By worrying about the what-ifs, I felt too unsure to commit to making these diagrams and infographics before in case something drastic changed, as well as being preoccupied with my own idea of what the ‘right’ timeline for producing a project was. I see now that I had more than enough information and capacity to do this work earlier, and that this probably would have kept me more settled before.
In my final week I am looking forward to finishing up interviews, streamlining the case and the available information, and getting the chance to trial-run my project’s use as a classroom resource to check its suitability!
As for integrity, this week I think the most development came from my final weekend travel. These last few weeks I’ve been making conscious efforts to listen to my feelings, and this week I really felt the benefit of being present. I spent the weekend in the cloud forest and rainforest: hiking, exploring, ultimately being surrounded by nature. I have chosen to link this to integrity because I felt present in these moments — I made the conscious decision to look and observe, swapping my phone camera for the nuances my brain was picking up on. What was I seeing, and what did that reveal about me and how I felt and how I see the world? Spotting the birds swirling in the sky from the boat crossing the lake, admiring how hairy the lianas were, watching the different splash patterns from the bubbling pool at the bottom of the waterfall — these were all moments that helped me feel grounded, placing myself a single component of a vast world of nature, full of more life and vivacity than I could ever comprehend. I’d like to apply this same sense of stillness and presence in my leadership and personal life. Instead of worrying about myself in the past or future, or the lives and choices of other people in the past or future, I’d like to spend the majority of my time in the company of who I am in this very moment, and use this knowledge to take decisions with integrity. As long as I am doing my best in the moment, I am doing enough.