SAIL

During high school, especially my senior year, I was determined to make myself known and become apart of everything! I was told by older friends, family, and loved ones that senior year would fly by and to make the most of those times. I took all that advice to heart and signed up for everything that I was able to. Not only did I sign up, but I held a lot of leadership positions as well. Needless to say, this left me feeling extremely burnt out by the end of the year. Although I value those great times, it really became too much for me to handle sometimes.

One of the main things that attracted me to Mason was the diversity found here. So when I first got accepted, I knew there would be tons and tons of clubs and organizations to choose from. However, by the time summer ended and the year was about to begin, I had gotten used to doing nothing. Even though, I heard my Patriot Leader over-emphasize the importance of getting involved, I told myself that I wouldn’t join anything at Mason because I worked myself so hard in high school. I wanted time to enjoy college and take everything in. That was one of the biggest mistakes I could’ve made. I really enjoyed that time of relaxation for the summer, but my mind was ready to get back into high gear once I started at Mason.

Often times as leaders, we don’t know how to balance or manage our time properly. As a result, we usually work ourselves to death. I was torn between becoming involved for fear of working myself too hard and just not doing anything at all. Also, living on a floor with such motivated, inspiring people didn’t help at all either. 🙂 Everyone around me was getting involved in some form and I was just chillen. I’m a firm believer that too much of anything can cause problems. How do you find balance in being a leader? When do you say this is too much? How do you know when you’ve signed up for too much? Is taking time for yourself a bad thing?

Just a few thoughts of mine…

By Lori Lawson

This week I am about to combine the two popular themes found in my posts – nerdy enthusiasm and Feminism. I am hoping that some of you have seen the television series Battlestar Galactica. Just this past weekend, I was exposed to the wonderful world of space warfare the is this show. Even if you haven’t seen it, however, I think you will still get my message.

After just a few of watching, I couldn’t help but to realize how prominent women are in the series. Even though the show is in the magical land of science and nerdiness, women help very powerful roles without anyone questioning them. The show features a female president, strong female antagonists, and an amazing fighter pilot learning how to become  a leader in the fleet.

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You all have probably heard about the Kony 2012 term by the advocacy group Invisible Children. Now that the year 2012 has come to a close, many wonder what will happen next and if Invisible Children has even done anything really…However, 2012 was a successful year to fight off Kony and his army of innocent child soldiers that were abducted from their homes throughout several years. Advocacy and leadership go hand in hand. Conversely, there are many that criticize Invisible Children for creating advocacy and apparently “not doing anything”. In my opinion these people aren’t educated enough of what happens to the donated money and what Invisible Children really does. Those who complain about the organization often or actually never check out the official Invisible Children’s website, where all the statistics of the donated money are listed and all the progress of the past years are shown. The first step of judging something is to actually do research and then an individual should critique it.

One of the many accomplishments that were achieved in the year of 2012, was that on May 12th, 2012 Caesar Achellam, the LRA’s top commander, was captured by the regional forces through the aid of awareness that Invisible Children and its chapters have created throughout the world. Also, there are currently 44 radio operators from CAR and DR Congo that were trained to facilitate the Early Warning Radio Network to protect its citizens from the LRA and its abduction strategies of recruiting young children to become child soldiers. Also, there 6 FM radio towers that broadcast “come home” messages over 26,801 square miles in the region where the LRA travels currently. 89% of escapees credit “come home” messaging as the reason they decided to attempt an escape in the first place. 30 rural communities in central Africa are linked into Invisible Children’s Early Warning Radio Network, which uses HF long-range radios to give advance warning of security threats.

This shows only a few things that show CHANGE, which started with a documentary of three inspired young men that created advocacy and awareness through the web. This truly shows how far Invisible Children has come and that it WILL NOT STOP HERE. So go out and create AWARENESS because no matter how small or big a step towards change is, it will create a domino effect. With today’s youth, anything is possible. Many students throughout the United States have formed smaller chapters to support Invisible Children’s mission to create awareness and change. Without their help, there would have been no real movement to make a difference. One great example of a student organization that wants to make a difference is our own George Mason University Invisible Children group that many of you are probably familiar with. They have recently hosted a Benefit Concert, where Branches and the Great Canyon Band performed, to gather as much donations as they could (Check out this article by Cameron Shuler). If you want to make a difference and be part of this great organization on campus, stop by the bi weekly meetings (GMU IC).

What do you think?

Do you believe that awareness is vital to create real change or should leaders only act immediately to create change?

Any comments are appreciated (:

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I thought it was so permitting to use a red rose since Valentines Day is tomorrow, but I would like to reference my time here at George Mason to the opening of the rose. I have definitely had a hard time starting college, but within the first three weeks of this second semester I have been opening up and having the best time of my life. I really have enjoyed Mason so much more now that I have engaged with other people like me. I love how close I’ve become with my hall and they have been nothing but supportive as I slowly open up. As much as I keep my feeling hidden and act like I have it all together, there has been a lot of stress and depression that I have had to face. Usually I just stay in my room and try not to worry anyone else with my problems but actually coming out and making friends has been the best thing I’ve ever done. I feel just like that flower opening in the video. To my surprise it actually mades living on campus so much more enjoyable when you have people that care about you. So shout-out to the two best LLC’s Leadership/Community Engagement and Sustainability, I so happy to be apart of an amazing group of people and I look forward to the rest of this semester with you guys!

A lot of times we don’t give ourselves enough credit. We are young and trying to make a difference and sometimes our efforts get overlooked because of our age . Whenever college students ( or young people in general) start doing service people don’t expect much, what they expect is what Wendy mentioned in class the other day as the “drive by service”. This thinking has to change because sometimes our efforts, as small as they may be, do make a difference; even if it just means changing the way others think, that’s a start!

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Over the past few days I got the amazing opportunity to be part of the RA Retreat and some leadership classes. I thought I knew what leadership truly meant and was fully capable and ready to become an RA. However, there is so much to learn!!!! There are so many personalities and identities that we as individuals aren’t aware of. Whether we are part of a dominant and/or subordinate group within society. These factors aren’t probably important to us at this moment, but as leaders to make real progress between different identities within a group, one has to know how to successfully address the hurdles from any angle. Therefore, I ask you to take a minute and look around you and see from a third person’s view of how you fit in a group and what you contribute or how others’ identities affect the group tone and progress. According to Richard Grant, “The value of identity of course is that so often with it comes a purpose.” If we realize how different and dynamic true identities of the people within our group are, then we can use it through diversity to make real change and progress as leaders of today. If you want to read more about self and social identity, which is a similar and cool concept as well (Purdue University).

What do you think?

Is it important to embrace individual identities to make a group stronger or should we label a group as one to be strong? Which one is better?

Let me know what you think!!! (:

Over break, I admittedly watched a ton of TV. I am very passionate about theatre and acting and I was thrilled when I saw just how involved celebrities are with certain causes and charities. I find it particularly inspiring that a lot of causes that celebrities support are the ones that don’t always get a lot of attention. I am sometimes bothered by the fact that the news and media only focus on particular causes and charities and not at all on others, so it was great to see how many celebrities were really passionate about causes that are less well known. Cystic fibrosis is a cause that does not get nearly enough attention. Many people do not understand the seriousness of this disease and how significantly it can impact one’s life. All of the funding for this disease is private, so charities like the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation need all of the help and donations that they can get. One of the main sources of support for this cause is Celine Dion. By publicly supporting the cause I am sure that she has brought much needed awareness about the disease.
Some people argue that celebrities are just supporting causes mindlessly in order to gain fame, but I’d like to think that this for the most part isn’t the case at all. Many celebrities have a deep personal connection to certain organizations, charities and causes. I have heard people say that celebrities are exploiting a cause for their own benefit, but I just don’t think this is true, after all even if they just bring attention to a cause that hasn’t gotten much in the past aren’t they already doing their part? What are your opinions on this?

So today I was thinking… Could someone make up their own type of leadership style and could it be superior then other leadership styles. Then I was like no…. saying one style is better than another is basically wrong all leaders change something. Even the leader s that fail help teach their followers how to improve from their failure. This leads to what I personally believe which is that everyone is a leader in their own special way.  What makes you a great leader is that all of your actions are intending to be positive to help a situation then hurt a situation.  It’s always about the effort that you put into whatever you do.