Personal narrative
I am now 20 years old, and I have spent more than half of my life with baseball. The beginning of my baseball life was when I was 7 years old. Every Sunday, my father took me to a nearby park in the early morning and played catch with me. At that time, it was one of the biggest pleasures for me. In fact, I have a great amount of memory with my father due to this baseball communication. When I was 9 years old, I joined in a local baseball club and began to practice baseball harder. Of course I continued to playing baseball after the graduation of elementary school, and also junior high school. All of the experience concerning to baseball is precious to me because it told me many things; the ability of sports, the importance of teamwork, the difficulty of human relationship, time management, and of course leadership.
Since I loved baseball, I continued to play baseball at high school. My high school is famous for baseball so the practice was really hard and, there were many strict and somewhat unreasonable rules, and I sometimes had to feel quite uncomfortable. In addition, the academic level of my high school was very high so there were quite a lot of assignments every day. At the beginning, I tried to on one hand, play baseball and on the other hand, study hard. That is, my goal was playing baseball with studying hard and getting high grades. However, even though I could get quite a good grade, to do so while practicing hard was not easy and I often cut my sleeping time. After the hellish winter practice of my first year, I began to think that this hectic life was not good for me and I couldn’t enjoy my high school life. Then I thought seriously about my life and finally made a decision to quit the high school baseball club. At that time, I felt comfortable because I had a lot of free time and spent them for studying. But after a few months, I felt lonely because I lost my good baseball friends and baseball community at high school, and above all, because I broke up with baseball which I had spent much time with. I thought many times whether I could go back to the team, but I did not have the courage to tell the teammates about it. Although I enjoyed my high school days and of course I have a lot of good memory, I regret quitting the baseball club even now. When I graduated from high school, the manager of my high school baseball team told me that he planed to appoint me as a captain. As I heard his words, I burst into tears because I felt that I failed to meet his expectation as well as betrayed my mind.
From this experience, I learned the importance of not giving up whatever I decide to do. In addition, I realize that what is important is doing things not perfectly, but as hard as possible. Somebody says that this is very natural, but since I had no experience of failure of the compatibility of baseball and studying, I believed that I could and must do both of them perfectly at that time. However, this was not true. I had to realize that the result of doing my best was the best consequence for me, and pursuing the perfect results was not the end. Therefore, now I try to do whatever I want to do as hard as possible, and I believe that the result of doing so will be good, or at least acceptable. By quitting baseball, I learned how it is painful to giving up what I want to do. In order not to regret again, I want to challenge many things with my best without concerning the result.
Baseball raised not only my body but also my mind. Now I am playing baseball to recover my high school days and to thank to baseball.
Yasuhito
2010年10月26日火曜日
2010年10月20日水曜日
Writing Assignment #6
My Conflict Management Strategy
According to "How You Act in Conflicts" sheet, my most common conflict strategy is smoothing. And I partly agree to this result.
In most case, I try to maintain the relationship so I sometimes give up my idea or I do not insist my opinion strongly. I use this strategy when I have conflict against my team members or my classmates, so called "good friends." This is because I believe that keeping good relationship is one of the most important things for leading or participating in an organization, and insisting just my opinion is sometimes break relation and trust. Somebody wants to say that by discussing they can get a good relationship with members. But I think that sometimes it is needed to compromise and give up personal view for a good of all. Of course I know that to become "the Owl" is important. It is ideal to ensure I and the other person "fully achieve our goals" by negotiation to resolve conflicts, even though it is very difficult.
On the other hand, when I talk with people who is not familiar with me or who does not so connect to me such as a staff of ICU Student Group, I will be "the shark," but the shark with ear which listen to the other person's opinion. For example, when I was a freshman, I visited Student Group to demand an explanation about the reason I could not go to ICU by motorbike. I tried to be gentle but their explanation was not the explanation so my way of speaking became stronger and stronger. I ended up giving up my demand, but this time I was so acrid. In that case, I did not care about the breaking of our relationship.
What I want to say is, people often choose each strategy according to with whom they discuss. If the opponents are good friends or a member of family, the most important thing for me is firstly listen to their opinion then explain my opinion, but explain not so strongly, I seek to the middle point of my goal if the situation is not good. But if the opponents are not-friendly people, I emphasize to get my goal even if there are possibilities that I break the relationship with them.
The relationship between people is the most difficult thing I have ever encountered. How do you think??
Yasu
According to "How You Act in Conflicts" sheet, my most common conflict strategy is smoothing. And I partly agree to this result.
In most case, I try to maintain the relationship so I sometimes give up my idea or I do not insist my opinion strongly. I use this strategy when I have conflict against my team members or my classmates, so called "good friends." This is because I believe that keeping good relationship is one of the most important things for leading or participating in an organization, and insisting just my opinion is sometimes break relation and trust. Somebody wants to say that by discussing they can get a good relationship with members. But I think that sometimes it is needed to compromise and give up personal view for a good of all. Of course I know that to become "the Owl" is important. It is ideal to ensure I and the other person "fully achieve our goals" by negotiation to resolve conflicts, even though it is very difficult.
On the other hand, when I talk with people who is not familiar with me or who does not so connect to me such as a staff of ICU Student Group, I will be "the shark," but the shark with ear which listen to the other person's opinion. For example, when I was a freshman, I visited Student Group to demand an explanation about the reason I could not go to ICU by motorbike. I tried to be gentle but their explanation was not the explanation so my way of speaking became stronger and stronger. I ended up giving up my demand, but this time I was so acrid. In that case, I did not care about the breaking of our relationship.
What I want to say is, people often choose each strategy according to with whom they discuss. If the opponents are good friends or a member of family, the most important thing for me is firstly listen to their opinion then explain my opinion, but explain not so strongly, I seek to the middle point of my goal if the situation is not good. But if the opponents are not-friendly people, I emphasize to get my goal even if there are possibilities that I break the relationship with them.
The relationship between people is the most difficult thing I have ever encountered. How do you think??
Yasu
2010年10月16日土曜日
Writing Assignment #5
Chapter 8
As the Author says, I think that to find something to celebrate is quite important to change the undesirable situation or atmosphere. So every time I try to look things carefully and find those things.
For example, when we play games, it is necessary to get and keep good atmosphere (in Japanese, NAGARE). And to get it, we need at least to be happy or cheerful even though the situation is not so good. But as you know this is very hard to be achieved. Then, what I usually do is to praise a player for his wonderful play. Or even though players are in the bench, I try to praise them for their cheerful voices and use them like "thank you your boosts! Hey guys, we should win in order not to waste their support!!"
For me and most of us, to celebrate the major successes is easy because they are obvious for everyone and everyone can celebrate. Of course I think it's very important to keep good condition of the organization. But I want to be a leader who can notice the very small action or behavior of my members which others couldn't recognize. Without care, it is too difficult to notice, but I think we can do it by having a broad viewpoint, which is necessary for leaders. And if I fail to notice small things, I have to reflect on myself, have to re-think about my behavior.
In conclusion, I want to say that to celebrate major and minor thing is necessary for the success of the organization as well as for keeping a good atmosphere. In addition, in order to celebrate things, we need careful observation, which is essential for leaders. That is, to see the things carefully and respond correctly is what leaders have to do and this is the key of successes of organizations.
P.S.
Thanks for my seniors, even though I couldn't do what I said above, our team's atmosphere is extremely good!!
Yasu
As the Author says, I think that to find something to celebrate is quite important to change the undesirable situation or atmosphere. So every time I try to look things carefully and find those things.
For example, when we play games, it is necessary to get and keep good atmosphere (in Japanese, NAGARE). And to get it, we need at least to be happy or cheerful even though the situation is not so good. But as you know this is very hard to be achieved. Then, what I usually do is to praise a player for his wonderful play. Or even though players are in the bench, I try to praise them for their cheerful voices and use them like "thank you your boosts! Hey guys, we should win in order not to waste their support!!"
For me and most of us, to celebrate the major successes is easy because they are obvious for everyone and everyone can celebrate. Of course I think it's very important to keep good condition of the organization. But I want to be a leader who can notice the very small action or behavior of my members which others couldn't recognize. Without care, it is too difficult to notice, but I think we can do it by having a broad viewpoint, which is necessary for leaders. And if I fail to notice small things, I have to reflect on myself, have to re-think about my behavior.
In conclusion, I want to say that to celebrate major and minor thing is necessary for the success of the organization as well as for keeping a good atmosphere. In addition, in order to celebrate things, we need careful observation, which is essential for leaders. That is, to see the things carefully and respond correctly is what leaders have to do and this is the key of successes of organizations.
P.S.
Thanks for my seniors, even though I couldn't do what I said above, our team's atmosphere is extremely good!!
Yasu
2010年10月9日土曜日
Writing Assignment #4
Chapter 6
As a leader of the baseball team, I often make a personal sacrifice for the team. Yesterday, to prepare today's baseball game, I went to ground and flattened the batter's box and the pitcher's mound. Usually, this kind of preparation is done by all members, but yesterday, since all other members had class or something and only those who were free was me, I'd done alone.
But I don't think this is sacrifice. This is because, as I already mentioned in the previous task, I am one of the members of the team. So this action is only not for the benefit of the team but also for myself. Due to this action, I was able to have more time today's morning. I think that what is important for leaders is not to think "I do this for the team, everybody in the team should thank me" but to think "if I do this, everybody including me will feel comfortable."
Of course to be a leader, having authority is important, because without that, nobody listen to me. Sometimes leaders need dignity. But more important thing is I think to have mind which make it possible to think that serving for the team is one of leader's duty and happiness. This makes the common pleasure among the team much bigger when we achieve something. That is, a special pleasure as a leader.
To "retain authority while maintaining a sense of equity (94)" is quite hard but very important. According to the author, in order to achieve this, Shackleton apologized when he was wrong. So firstly I'm going to imitate him and want to be a better leader.
We have only 3 games to go, if possible, I want to win all the games. And this is one of my duties...even though it's very tough...
Yasu
As a leader of the baseball team, I often make a personal sacrifice for the team. Yesterday, to prepare today's baseball game, I went to ground and flattened the batter's box and the pitcher's mound. Usually, this kind of preparation is done by all members, but yesterday, since all other members had class or something and only those who were free was me, I'd done alone.
But I don't think this is sacrifice. This is because, as I already mentioned in the previous task, I am one of the members of the team. So this action is only not for the benefit of the team but also for myself. Due to this action, I was able to have more time today's morning. I think that what is important for leaders is not to think "I do this for the team, everybody in the team should thank me" but to think "if I do this, everybody including me will feel comfortable."
Of course to be a leader, having authority is important, because without that, nobody listen to me. Sometimes leaders need dignity. But more important thing is I think to have mind which make it possible to think that serving for the team is one of leader's duty and happiness. This makes the common pleasure among the team much bigger when we achieve something. That is, a special pleasure as a leader.
To "retain authority while maintaining a sense of equity (94)" is quite hard but very important. According to the author, in order to achieve this, Shackleton apologized when he was wrong. So firstly I'm going to imitate him and want to be a better leader.
We have only 3 games to go, if possible, I want to win all the games. And this is one of my duties...even though it's very tough...
Yasu
2010年10月2日土曜日
Writing Assignment #3
In terms of stamina, I know that to maintain my stamina as an individual as well as a leader is important because if I lost my stamina, I can't do anything for me and for others and others around me will worry or sometimes will be angry at me. For example, our baseball team's ex-captain sometimes says to me, "you are the captain so you have to behave as a captain, you shouldn't say any negative words about yourself because those words make members uncomfortable."
I think that being a leader needs to be a symbol or be a good example of that organization. So, as the author says, maintaining stamina for managing an organization well is extremely important.
And I also think that one of the roles of a captain is to cheer others up whenever they look, say, tired. Based on this thought, when I feel tired and feel not good as a leader, I treat myself as like other members. As I said in the previous assignment, this is my strategy to be a leader and good individual who has a great amount of energy; treating myself as another person. The leader Yasu cheer one of the members called Yasu when the leader thinks he is tired.
But none the less, there are times when I want to leave myself alone. Even such a tough time, however, I try not to talk about my anxieties to anyone except some of the good friends. This is because I don't want to confuse them. Of course some friends are very kind and listen to me and give me a good advice, but most of them don't think seriously or think too seriously so I can't talk to them. Now I try to solve my own problem by myself. Do you think it is nonsense??
Instead of talking to friends, every day (when I behave as a leader) I keep a journal. What's happened today and if the happening is a problem, what I should do to solve it etc... This doesn't confuse anybody and I can say good bye to my problems, that is, I can get the hope for tomorrow. I believe that writing down what I thought is quite useful and beneficial.
Anyway, I want to live with a strong mind and will. And to achieve this goals, I'm going not to lose my stamina.
Yasu
I think that being a leader needs to be a symbol or be a good example of that organization. So, as the author says, maintaining stamina for managing an organization well is extremely important.
And I also think that one of the roles of a captain is to cheer others up whenever they look, say, tired. Based on this thought, when I feel tired and feel not good as a leader, I treat myself as like other members. As I said in the previous assignment, this is my strategy to be a leader and good individual who has a great amount of energy; treating myself as another person. The leader Yasu cheer one of the members called Yasu when the leader thinks he is tired.
But none the less, there are times when I want to leave myself alone. Even such a tough time, however, I try not to talk about my anxieties to anyone except some of the good friends. This is because I don't want to confuse them. Of course some friends are very kind and listen to me and give me a good advice, but most of them don't think seriously or think too seriously so I can't talk to them. Now I try to solve my own problem by myself. Do you think it is nonsense??
Instead of talking to friends, every day (when I behave as a leader) I keep a journal. What's happened today and if the happening is a problem, what I should do to solve it etc... This doesn't confuse anybody and I can say good bye to my problems, that is, I can get the hope for tomorrow. I believe that writing down what I thought is quite useful and beneficial.
Anyway, I want to live with a strong mind and will. And to achieve this goals, I'm going not to lose my stamina.
Yasu
2010年9月25日土曜日
Writing Assignment #2
Responce to the Expedition Log questions.
Answer 1
As the auther says, I think "self-talk" is quite important when faced with some difficulties because I strongly believe that "to consistently send positive messages that override voices of discouragement and pessimism (Perkins 54)" is efficient. So everytime I face adversity, I say to myself that, "this is the test from your destiny, you can't change or escape from this derstiny and you have to accept it. But if you can get over it, you will be a more attractive and competent. Just do it." I believe that these kind of tough situation is good opportunity to improve ourselves. As Kennedy family says, "when the going gets tough, the tough get going." Let's take some actions before complaining!!
Answer 2
When I went to Pittsburgh with my team mate to play baseball, I was told that I should be more like captain. There were some misunderstanding between my team mate and I (If I talk about this topic, it will takes half an hour). But anyway, I was really shocked because I thought I did my best and my behavior was good for all of members. I talked with them, I cried, then I talked to myself. "My behavior is not incorrect. Just because there are some gaps between their thoughts and mine. What I missed is that I couldn't make myself understood by them correctly. That's the way it goes because we are human being." I felt that communication was really difficult even in this kind of a small comunity. But by admitting this difficulties, I could get over this tough situation. I strongly think that not feeling depressed but swiching feeling or the way you think is a key point.
Answer 3
In my baseball team, sometimes bench warmers look like depressed because they can't play in games. Of courece that is because they don't have enough skills compared to the regular players to play in the game. However, it is also the fact that I couldn't give them any opportunity to show their ability. So the other day I made an opportunity to see their ability and now I tell all the bench warmers that you have a chance today as a pinch hitter before the game even though the game seems to going to be tough. I hope it change their depressing feeling.
But actually I think I can't make them happy, I know that how bitter for not playing in the game because I was a bench warmer. It's just a lip comfort. So I'm sorry but maybe I can't instill optimism in this situation and can't reframe this situation.
Answer 4
I can't come up with the most dificult assignment. But most of my friend are optimist and they cheer me up when I am depressed if I tell them about my worries. The problem is I am not the optimist so it's the end if I gloom. Actually I don't want to talk about my personal anxiety. So I could say that if I open my mind, the OQ around me is high enough so we can success.
Answer 5
I already have learned that escaping from reality only produce regrets when I was a high school student. One thing I think important is to listen to the opinion of others. It seems quite important to think by myself but sometimes we need other point of views. Those people tell me some information that I don't want to accept but need to hear for making the best decision. So I try to open my mind as hard as possible and try not to refuse bad news. I'm always ready to be criticized or confused, but have confident to get over.
Tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, we have games and I have no weekend so I did this assignment now...sleepy. Sorry Ken, perhaps this is not the answers you expected.
Yasuhito
Answer 1
As the auther says, I think "self-talk" is quite important when faced with some difficulties because I strongly believe that "to consistently send positive messages that override voices of discouragement and pessimism (Perkins 54)" is efficient. So everytime I face adversity, I say to myself that, "this is the test from your destiny, you can't change or escape from this derstiny and you have to accept it. But if you can get over it, you will be a more attractive and competent. Just do it." I believe that these kind of tough situation is good opportunity to improve ourselves. As Kennedy family says, "when the going gets tough, the tough get going." Let's take some actions before complaining!!
Answer 2
When I went to Pittsburgh with my team mate to play baseball, I was told that I should be more like captain. There were some misunderstanding between my team mate and I (If I talk about this topic, it will takes half an hour). But anyway, I was really shocked because I thought I did my best and my behavior was good for all of members. I talked with them, I cried, then I talked to myself. "My behavior is not incorrect. Just because there are some gaps between their thoughts and mine. What I missed is that I couldn't make myself understood by them correctly. That's the way it goes because we are human being." I felt that communication was really difficult even in this kind of a small comunity. But by admitting this difficulties, I could get over this tough situation. I strongly think that not feeling depressed but swiching feeling or the way you think is a key point.
Answer 3
In my baseball team, sometimes bench warmers look like depressed because they can't play in games. Of courece that is because they don't have enough skills compared to the regular players to play in the game. However, it is also the fact that I couldn't give them any opportunity to show their ability. So the other day I made an opportunity to see their ability and now I tell all the bench warmers that you have a chance today as a pinch hitter before the game even though the game seems to going to be tough. I hope it change their depressing feeling.
But actually I think I can't make them happy, I know that how bitter for not playing in the game because I was a bench warmer. It's just a lip comfort. So I'm sorry but maybe I can't instill optimism in this situation and can't reframe this situation.
Answer 4
I can't come up with the most dificult assignment. But most of my friend are optimist and they cheer me up when I am depressed if I tell them about my worries. The problem is I am not the optimist so it's the end if I gloom. Actually I don't want to talk about my personal anxiety. So I could say that if I open my mind, the OQ around me is high enough so we can success.
Answer 5
I already have learned that escaping from reality only produce regrets when I was a high school student. One thing I think important is to listen to the opinion of others. It seems quite important to think by myself but sometimes we need other point of views. Those people tell me some information that I don't want to accept but need to hear for making the best decision. So I try to open my mind as hard as possible and try not to refuse bad news. I'm always ready to be criticized or confused, but have confident to get over.
Tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, we have games and I have no weekend so I did this assignment now...sleepy. Sorry Ken, perhaps this is not the answers you expected.
Yasuhito
2010年9月22日水曜日
Writing Assignment #1
Actually it is very hard to think about my future vision. But wherever I work for, I want to be a competent business person.
So my long-term vision is to be a capable person who, if being the top of the organization or a department, can lead others to the right place and make benefit.
And I think that competent person has a higher viewpoint. In my opinion, what ordinary people do is just to follow the superiors' opinions or ideas. However, I guess that competent person can look a present condition or something from two perspectives, one is from that person's own point of view and the other is the viewpoint of some organization itself. What I want to say is to become a capable person, I think I need a subjective view point and an objective view point.
To achieve this goal, I made a short-term goal. As you know now I am the captain of the ICU Baseball Club, and actually I decide every days' training (practice) menu and the starting lineup of the game by myself. This is really a good experience for me but sometimes quite difficult. This is because I have to grasp whose condition is good/bad to decide starting lineups, and what is worse, there are 6 seniors in our team so sometimes I have to say bitter messages to them.
Therefore, I would say that I have an opportunity to improve the two-dimension viewpoint as I mentioned above through my captain experience. By seeing other player's condition and deciding the starting lineups, or discuss seniors, I believe I can improve my objective point of view because nobody follows me if I behave based on only my own subjective opinion.
Now, to make this happen, I would like to do two things. First, I try to practice harder than anybody else in our team and make my message persuasive. I think nobody trust or follow me if my baseball skill is not enough but say that "you are not in good condition and I do not let you go to the ground" or something like that. Word is important, but behavior is sometimes more important. Second, I try to treat me as another person, that is, I should be a leader of the team but also should be the one of the members of the team. If I am not in good condition, I have to stay at bench. I believe this is another way to make objectivity.
If I would say my short-term goal in one sentence, this is it. To make my leadership realize, get as many "wins" of the game as possible.
Through this baseball experience, I want to get a higher perspective which other players do not have, and I want to connect this precious opportunity to my long-term vision. Someday I want to be a leader who is followed by every colleague.
P.S.
If you are interested in baseball, join us!!.
Yasuhito
So my long-term vision is to be a capable person who, if being the top of the organization or a department, can lead others to the right place and make benefit.
And I think that competent person has a higher viewpoint. In my opinion, what ordinary people do is just to follow the superiors' opinions or ideas. However, I guess that competent person can look a present condition or something from two perspectives, one is from that person's own point of view and the other is the viewpoint of some organization itself. What I want to say is to become a capable person, I think I need a subjective view point and an objective view point.
To achieve this goal, I made a short-term goal. As you know now I am the captain of the ICU Baseball Club, and actually I decide every days' training (practice) menu and the starting lineup of the game by myself. This is really a good experience for me but sometimes quite difficult. This is because I have to grasp whose condition is good/bad to decide starting lineups, and what is worse, there are 6 seniors in our team so sometimes I have to say bitter messages to them.
Therefore, I would say that I have an opportunity to improve the two-dimension viewpoint as I mentioned above through my captain experience. By seeing other player's condition and deciding the starting lineups, or discuss seniors, I believe I can improve my objective point of view because nobody follows me if I behave based on only my own subjective opinion.
Now, to make this happen, I would like to do two things. First, I try to practice harder than anybody else in our team and make my message persuasive. I think nobody trust or follow me if my baseball skill is not enough but say that "you are not in good condition and I do not let you go to the ground" or something like that. Word is important, but behavior is sometimes more important. Second, I try to treat me as another person, that is, I should be a leader of the team but also should be the one of the members of the team. If I am not in good condition, I have to stay at bench. I believe this is another way to make objectivity.
If I would say my short-term goal in one sentence, this is it. To make my leadership realize, get as many "wins" of the game as possible.
Through this baseball experience, I want to get a higher perspective which other players do not have, and I want to connect this precious opportunity to my long-term vision. Someday I want to be a leader who is followed by every colleague.
P.S.
If you are interested in baseball, join us!!.
Yasuhito
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