Week 2 Reading Diary: Continued PDE Ramayana

After reading more from Part B of  Ramayana, I thought Bharata ‘s character in this reading is adorable. His devotion towards brother Rama is outstanding. Bharata not wanting to go back to the kingdom and wanting to become king after the death of Dashratha shows the true Brotherhood. The part where he asks Rama to wear a gold sandals and then takes them to be placed upon the throne and declares that he will not return to the kingdom till Rama returns, instead would live as a devotee for fourteen years with matted hair and in a robe of bark. Bharata’s action shows his devotion, love and respect for Rama. Also in the reading it implies various times that the situation that Rama is going through is what the God has planned; the plan to destroy Ravana. Also various characters that Rama met to this time already knew he was coming for their rescue. 

Rama, Bharata and Paduka
Image link: Rama-Bharata-Paduka

The story of Rama already being written by God and working our perfectly is amazing. When Lakshmana said, “Do not fear for Rama, O fair one. No Rakshasa can injure him. I must obey his command and remain beside thee. The cry thou hast heard is an illusion wrought by demons.” in The Chase we could feel the love, determination, respect and confidence of Lakshmana towards his brother Rama.  These word’s of Lakshmana is shows the strong connection between the two Brothers.

Title of the book: Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913)

Source: book-mackenzie-indian-myth

Week 2 Reading Diary: PDE Ramayana

The story of Dashratha was quiet interesting. Dashratha not having any son to continue his royal thorne and then he went for a big horse scarification to get boons and have four sons was quiet extra ordinary. My favourite moment in the reading was when Rama and Lakshmana vows to protect Rita. The moment when Viswamitra gave those celestial weapons to Rama and he said  “When I have need of you, I will think of you, and then you will wait upon me.” from thataka gives me a sense of power. Those words makes oneself feel powered. The part where kaikeyi wanted her son Bharata to get the throne and make Rama leave the kingdom for 14 years was sad for me.

Rama breaks the Bow of Shiva
The breaking of the Bow of Janaka
Source: Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie
Link to the Book: mackenzie

Week 1 Review

Looking back at the announcements and posts this past week, my favorite one was from the Learning challenges assignment. The first video that is titled "The Time You Have (In JellyBeans)" blew my mind. The video almost brought me to tears and made me realize how short life is. Watching that video made me realize the value of time. I first just was scheming through the assignment and almost missed the video while scrolling down but good thing I decided to double check and saw the video. I also shared this video with some of my own friends and it made their day. It is very important to enjoy everything we do in life and make sure we are doing something valuable. 

Link to the video and assignment: http://onlinecourselady.pbworks.com/w/page/103904909/time

  

                      Link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOksW_NabEk

Famous Last Words

It has been a while since I've taken a class that involves writing. All my MIS classes are about working with various software and presentations and there is no much writing involved. It is kind of surprising to me looking at how involved I am while writing blogs for this class. It is like I am liking to write all over again. I have learned so much in just one week. I have had time to reflect on my childhood memories writing about blog post about Rama and Sita. I cannot wait to learn more and explore my writing skills.

I really enjoyed reading different blog posts written by students that were posted at
the end of all the assignment descriptions. It was just nice to see what people think and all the insights they shared on the common topics we were assigned. This week has given a good idea of what the rest of my semester is going to look like and I think we all will enjoy this great way of interacting with each other through blogs. The way class is structured is great as there going to be a lot of exciting things to read and write.

I enjoyed writing the very first post which was about my favorite place. I just like talking about my country. While writing that post I had time to think about places I have been too. I love traveling and writing that post made me want to think about places I wanna go. I want to travel more and explore more. I truly believe that traveling broadens one's mind. I am taking 6 classes this semester and writing and reading for this class is like a break for me as all my other classes are very stressful. Overall, I am excited about coming weeks and all the readings.

Plane
https://static.pexels.com/photos/9482/plane.jpg

Tech Tip, Blogger Templates

For my first tech tip assignment, I changed the template on my blog that changed the background of my blog. To change it, I clicked on Design tab on the top and clicked on template. Then I went ahead a chose Awesome Inc. design and made it look all pretty.

Learning Challenges H.E.A.R.T

I personally think, in life, staying happy and healthy is very important. If anyone asked how I want to like my life, I would definitely use the word "happy" and "healthy". Loving and caring about people and things is general is important, but loving yourself and taking care of yourself is vital. Knowing what you want and setting goals and working hard to fulfill the goal, having a direction and an idea of where you want to go is I think important to stay in track. I have been working on health and happiness everyday.

Another thing is time management. I think for full time students like us, this is something everyone is struggling with including me. I have always struggling managing my work and school schedule since I started college. College is hard and we all know it. There had been times when I miss out some assignments and due dates just because of my poor time management skills. Starting last semester, I had to do something to work things out. I started off by taking baby steps like getting a planner and making a list of things I need to complete and have to finish within certain amount of time. Doing this helped a lot and I will continue to do so. This is the area I think I am getting better at by staying more organized but then, it is also something I still have a lot of room to work on. Procrastination and lack of time management is the major reason for stressful times we go through and I am still learning to get better at it.

Time management
https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7340/9964430453_05569096dc_b.jpg

Growth Mindset: Learning about Growth Mindset

I was never familiar with Carol Dwek TED talks.  After going over the videos I think I agree with her on everything she says about growth mindset. I have always been an average student since childhood and I think I can relate to both growth mindset and fixed mindset. When I was in high school I would not have to try too hard to make an A. I would end up with at least a B and I would not care that much. Whereas, after joining college I have been facing a lot of challenges throughout. During my freshmen year, I was not putting too much effort and still making A’s and B’s and I was fine with that. However, last semester I struggled because I was taking all my major MIS classes. I almost got my first ever C. I have never made a C in my life and I guess that’s when it struck me. I started making effort to do better and not let it bring me down. I actually tried to understand the material and learn more than just giving up or ignoring the challenge. I guess that was my year of bringing growth mindset into practice without even knowing.

I think Carol is right when she talks about making things a little harder and making things easy will prevent students from learning as much as they could. I love challenges now and like to learn more from the classes I am taking and take full advantage of this opportunity to learn more and just grow. I am excited to learn more about the growth mindset. I personally think that setting up goals and knowing what you want is really important to move forward in life.

Growth Mindset. Source: flickr