Most of us are excellent at being self-deprecating, and are not so good at the opposite. Tell us your favorite thing about yourself.
As humans, it natural that we criticize and find faults in ourselves. We rarely think about the positive things about ourselves because we want to improve ourselves. With that said, we must constantly evaluate ourselves for points of improvement. However, always looking for faults in ourselves is kind of… pessimistic. It is good for us to look at the positive points of ourselves every once in awhile.
On a different level, I believe that Western and Eastern cultures have different opinions about finding good things about ourselves. Growing up in western society, I have found that I am encouraged to flaunt my talents and skills. For example, in job interviews and on resumes, the idea is that I have to almost “brag” about my abilities. On the other hand, I also grew up in a traditional Chinese household, where “saving face” is extremely important. In this sense, I was taught to make sure that I brag about myself modestly. After staying in Korea, I found that they also applied a similar concept of bragging about oneself modestly in their culture. For example, in western society, if a person commented on how fast I can type on a computer, I would probably respond by saying that I had worked at an insurance company for 5 years and acquired the skill- blah blah blah. In contrast, in eastern society, I would respond by saying no I’m really not that great at typing. I remember being in Korea and when family friends/elders commented on how me and my friend were beautiful, I would say “아니에요, 아니에요…” and look down while my friend would say “감사합니다.” They laughed because my friend was an obvious foreigner, but commented that she wasn’t very modest. My host dad later explained that saying “thank you” to such a remark meant that she knew she was beautiful, therefore not acting very modest.
So… where am I going with this whole speech?
Well, I think it’s very hard for me to think about what’s my favorite thing about myself because I do consider modesty, even if this is a prompt and I am only typing it on my blog. I’ve never seriously thought about what I liked myself because it just felt weird to think “I like myself because _______.”
I spent nearly half the day thinking about my good qualities and I’ve finally come to the conclusion that I really like how passionate I am. Once I find something that I am passionate about, I put all I have into it. This quality definitely stresses me out constantly, but I don’t think I would be where I am now if I didn’t possess this quality. Most people have one true passion, but I have several- and it’s okay to have more than one. There are things that I come across and they move me in some way to make me passionate about it. For example, I am passionate about NK/SK relations and it has led me to study Korean so that I can communicate with defectors.
It’s really hard to explain to other people why I love my sense of passion so much. But I know that being so passionate makes me happy and gives me motivation. I’ve never liked doing anything without a purpose… quite frankly, I hate wasting time. Passion gives me a reason.
When it comes to what I like about myself, there are many options- eyes, hair, lips, personality, etc. Those are all things that other people can “brag” about. I want to “brag” about something that no one else can.
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