EDITING WITHOUT CHANGING THE CONTENT I have wrote this paper but I want you to change the grammars and vocabulary choices At the bottom of the paper I have my work citation I want you to put it in A

EDITING WITHOUT CHANGING THE CONTENT I have wrote this paper but I want you to change the grammars and vocabulary choices At the bottom of the paper I have my work citation I want you to put it in A
I am the main character in my own story. A character that makes discernments, mistakes and always looks for greatness. I have been afraid of wasting time because I always want to maximize my commitment toward financial and psychological liberation. I feel I have gained a partial freedom over the time of this quarter. I don’t have an answer to all my questions but one of the greatest things I have learned in this class is not knowing all the answers is a temporary answer itself. Many times I have attempted to take full control in my life and I have encountered consistent failure but this class has taught me that “Life is like a river rafting and we don’t have full control”. I have begun to go with the flow if things are beyond my control. I have been searching for the entire truth; questioning elders, church leaders and influencers are some of the actions I took on finding the truth of this universe and my purpose in life. Along the way I have noticed that I have never received a satisfactory answer. This used to make me angry and underestimate my influencers yet one thing I have forgotten is to ask myself these questions and meditate on them and see if there is a solution within me. Self realization is the key factor of one’s success and happiness. One of the most important lessons I took from this course is understanding discernment and how it influences my decision making. The main factor of discernment is understanding when to ask, what to ask and your attitude toward the solution. Discernment is a word of wisdom; understanding discernment is understanding myself and where I came from and where I am going. There are five exercises of discernment we have discussed in class based on Ignatian Spirituality. They are Self awareness, Contextual awareness, Practices of listening, Freedom of heart and Relationship/community. These practices have given me to further contemplate my life and realize where they have occurred. The truth is these practices are ongoing as long as I am breathing. I will keep making mistakes, I will realize them and I will fix them using the practices. Yet, thus far I have been practicing this exercise without noticing I will further explain where in my life they have occurred. Relatively to many other people I have my own unique story and upcoming. I went to numerous hardships at a young age yet one of my personal qualifications is perseverance. I came from a rough childhood background. My father was a soldier at the Eritrean army force and my mother was working as a housekeeper to provide for us. At a young age I didn’t see any future in Eritrea; therefore at the age of 13, I started looking for other opportunities that can effectuate my educational and sustainable financial target. The best option I found was to leave my homeland and my family to cross the border. This was the hardest decision I have ever made. At the age of 14, after twenty-eight treacherous days I reached Egypt. However, life in Egypt wasn’t as easy as I thought. Many were discriminating against my Christian faith and skin tone. After three years I was fortunate to come to the United States as a refugee with the UNSR help. For I was only 17 years old, the American government obligated me to live with foster parents I met at the SeaTac airport. Luckily my foster parents were an extremely caring and loving family but that doesn’t mean my time being with them went smoothly. Me and my foster family had cultural and language barriers and these obstacles used to create misunderstanding between us. These barriers helped me to quickly adopt our differences and take the most of it. Under all this hardship I was still managing my time wisely on fulfilling my educational and financial objectives. In 2017, after graduating from high school I also graduated from the foster care system. After I started living on my own, I had to work extra hours in order to pay all my bills and at the same time I had to take courses at the community college to achieve my desire of becoming a computer science expert. Fall 2021 I began my journey at Seattle university to get my undergraduate degree. Being independent since a young age has helped me to gain self awareness. Back in Eritrea my culture and my church didn’t allow me to process complex ideas by myself and asking for further questions or arguing with elders is considered taboo. Therefore, I used to accept things as they are and didn’t have my own values I can rely on. Yet after I left my family and migrated to Egypt I began to have self awareness due to cultural, and religious differences I encountered. My independence had led me to understand myself more and to gain freedom of heart/imagination and that had its own position and negative aspects. I was too comfortable in my freedom but that led me to always disagree with people and it affected my relationship with my community. I believed I was always right. I would blame people for being narrow minded. My Freedom affected me to be judgmental toward others. I didn’t understand as much as freedom of imagination was important, that my spirituality and mental well-being was significant. After reading many books that were written by Pope Shnouda of coptic orthodox regarding life, ministry and fasting, I realized the characteristics of freedom and spirituality. “Many authors acknowledge that spirituality involves an individual’s searching for meaning in life, wholeness, peace, individuality, and harmony.” Ruth A. Tanyi. One’s spirituality should not affect other people’s choices. However, at this time of my life unconsciously I was attacking my community for not agreeing with me. I described them as narrow minded and not open to new ideas. I didn’t find peace within myself for judging others; rather, I should have stayed for what I believed to be true and not be concerned about other’s choices. “One struggle ends just to go right to the next” Martin Luther King. After I overcome my self awareness and next struggle becomes keeping my freedom. After I left Egypt I bagan to dedicate my time reading the bible and other books about religious perspectives and our situations after life. While I was in such a phase I used to consistently get in arguments with my foster mother who was a practical seventh adventiste follower. Despite her knowledge about the bible, her ultimate goal was on persuading me into her beliefs. I found that to be unfair and not different from what I have experienced in Eritrea and Egypt. Most religious people I have talked to thus far always claim to be right and everyone else is wrong. This kind of perspective doesn’t allow people to engage in conversation. After I began attending church with my community in Seattle I met a friend named Yosief who seemed to be open to conversation, appreciate differences and not emotionally driven. Myself and Yosief spent countless hours talking about philosophy, religion, politics and spirituality. We have never tried to persuade one another, instead in a friendly manner we say what we think to be the truth. Since Yosief was older than me, he often would talk about context and its importance to understand situations and complex topics. For instance he used to frequently say “The bible is easily translatable to anything”. Even if someone wants to claim that God is a monster they would still find verses that would support their claim, if they don’t spend time to understand the deeper meaning behind the verses. Three years ago, I gifted a book about Christ’s passion to a friend. The book had a picture of Christ to symbolize his sufferings. A month later I asked her if she read the book; she said she didn’t read it but she let me know that she didn’t like the cover picture because Christ’s leg was slightly curved and how much it made him look bad. ( I asked her if she had read the book a month later, and she said no, but she did tell me she didn’t like the cover picture because Christ’s leg was slightly bent, and she thought it made him seem bad). I didn’t say much but I tried to contemplate her point of view and I found out that she was destined by the church’s dogma. I advised her to focus on the context instead of the picture or other flashy objects. If that event had occurred at this moment I would have advised her to practice contemplating like Ignatian has pointed out instead of relying on tradition and religion alone. The Lord “after insults and outrages, he might die on the cross” Ignatian prayer pg. 113. Contemplation would have helped her to focus on the context and be present with Christ. That’s what I am doing right now when I end up confusing myself. Growing up I was giving too much credit to church leaders, educated people and parents because I felt they know everything. Giving them too much credit and believing everything they say has affected me because I didn’t listen to my thoughts. Furthermore, I was not effectively listening to people who are not educated or church members. I didn’t notice that until recently. The more I began to contemplate and meditate, my flaws were destroying me. In the movie Selma President Lyndon B. Johnson said “I will be damned to let history put me in the same place as the likes of you” to Gov. George Wallace finally started to listen to his consciousness. Before that, not listening to his own thoughts and worrying about his power negatively affected his discernment to sensitive problems. Similarly, not listening to my thoughts has stolen my happiness because I kept making unsatisfactory decisions. For example, I like helping people but sometimes I hurt myself while helping people because I don’t put my priorities first. I become too engaged in their life and problems and at the end of the day I lose my boundaries. Going hiking, praying in my room and having genuine conversation the people often helped me to practice listening. My rough childhood and being a deep thinker have affected my relationship with my community and relatives. I noticed this when I had a phone conversation with my uncle who is a political activist. He openly told me that he doesn’t like me because I frequently challenge him with unsolvable ideas. Additionally our priest hated me because he thought I was going to negatively influence the believer. Every time I want to involve myself at the church activities he would say I am going too far. After I realized this I began to mind my own thoughts and not talk to people if they don’t want to hear. Yet I am not going to stop studying further because I believe there is always room for improvement. Now, I still socialize with them but I socialize as a different person. Although, my perspectives are different and I am always careful while communicating. To conclude, I have been practicing discernment exercises without knowing them very well. Taking this course has helped me to know more things about my strength and how I can socialize without hurting my feelings. The most important thing I want to emphasize is that I have mastered all this practice and I don’t think I am going to master them because I am a man who consistently makes mistakes but wants to correct my flaws as much as I can. From now and on I am going to make a discernment based on Ignation’s teaching. One most important lesson I am taking with me is the practice of contemplation. On top of that understanding I am not the only one who is running the world and I don’t have full control over everything. I am not going to rush into conclusion and judgment because I have learned that there is always more to everything if I focus more into context rather than words alone. Work citations: Ruth A. Tanyi, (May, 2002) “Nursing Theory And Concept Development or analysis towards clarifications of meaning of sprituality”, (p.g 502) David Lonsdale, (published in Great Britain in 2000), “Eyes To See, Ears To Hear” DuVernay, A. (2014). Selma. Paramount Pictures.