Life has been rather interesting lately, a struggle. I think right now I'm experiencing a fork in the road for many paths in my life. The question is what to act on. I've been journaling ALOT during this process: thinking about my past, examining the present, and preparing for the future. A few elements have stood out to me and have also percolated to the surface within A Novel Idea.
Relationships
I think this is something we have learned from our exploration of the lives of our participants. It is helpful to seek out others for support, but it seems that it most often happens naturally when we let people into our lives. I also don’t think that relationships with others are necessary for transformative learning to occur—it depends on the individual (p.38).
I am hesitant to say that critical self-reflection can occur without our being aware of it. I think, by definition, critical self-reflection is a cognitive activity (hence the many critiques of Mezirow’s work for being cognitive and rational). Becoming conscious through dreams, meditation, artwork, or physical activity occurs, for sure, but can we call it reflection? I don’t especially like the dualism created between reflection and intuition, and I see both of these processes as existing side by side rather than being either-or concepts. But this doesn’t mean they are synonymous, but rather complementary. I hope I am making sense here! (p.83).
For some reason, I have always thought of transformative learning being an individual journey, which yes, it is, but the relationships you foster with others can help/and/or/hinder this journey.
When I initially began to reflect back on my life thus far, I always saw transformation coming from negative relationships I observed or experienced.
Growing up, my parents' relationship was quite abusive and traumatic, I ended up perpetuating this toxicity by inadvertently falling into abusive relationships myself. I could never figure out why this happened, because I knew it was not what I had strived for, but perhaps I stayed in these types of relationships for so long, because I was conditioned into thinking it was normal from such an early age.
I also grew up in an extremely low income household, and was motivated by my parents (who both have not graduated high school) to excel academically in order to create more opportunities for myself with a goal of becoming self sustaining. My teachers noticed this drive and encouraged me along the way, giving me the confidence to achieve my goal and attend college, fully funded.
When I had moved out of state for school, at a small, wealthy liberal arts college, I felt completely isolated and unable to relate to my peers who came from more stable economic backgrounds. By fate, I was placed in a first year writing seminar with a Professor who had also too come from a complicated, and poor environment. During my four years at University, he became my mentor and encouraged me along the way when I experienced self doubt and 'imposter syndrome' at a school where I could not confide in or relate to my peers.
As I began to cultivate my skills as an artist, and find my own artistic voice as a writer and painter, my work inherently began to reflect deep seeded thoughts and beliefs related to myself and identity.
When I think more about this, I agree that there is this relationship between reflection and intuition. They aren't entirely synonymous. Something that I have kept up with this semester is collaging as a form of meditation. In a way, it feels like reading auras--something a bit hokey, yet something a bit true--I've noticed that when I initially rip and paste images together, I do this from an aesthetic, visual perspective. After the fact, when I actually look at the images, they seem to reveal something more. Perhaps this is line we toe between reflection and intuition.
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