My Time at Purdue: Failure to Success in 4 years

Who I am is irrelevant without first knowing my life experiences.

As I finish my last week as a student at Purdue, I have been thinking back about my 4 years at this school. And I realized that a famous line, written by Charles Dickens in a Tale of Two Cities, sums up my four years at Purdue perfectly,

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

My time at Purdue was the best of times, more recently, and the worst of times, during my first two years at Purdue. My Freshmen year started out in August 2011, and just like everyone else, I was happy to be on my own, but homesick because I missed my high school friends. They were some of the best people I ever met in my life, you all know who you are.   Then, my high school friend Matt died in late September. It was a life changing event for me, and for many others. Everyone has their own way of dealing with things, and everyone thought that I was dealing with such a traumatic event in my life, just fine. They were right to some extent, but the Purdue Police wouldn’t agree with them. Exactly 6 months after Matt died, I was arrested and put in jail for the night. Within 6 months, arguably 2 of the worst things that could have happened to me, did happen to me. Even worse, these two events had happened in an environment that I didn’t necessarily have a great support system. My friends at Purdue were great, but I didn’t have the support I used to have. If being arrested taught me one thing, it was that you simply shouldn’t break the law.

I came back to Purdue to start my Sophomore year with a court appearance hanging over my head. I completed all of the courts requirements: community service, a class, and tests. Really, my sophomore year at Purdue was the least productive year of my life. I don’t know why this was so, but living by myself for the first time may have contributed. I had very little interest in Accounting, which was what I was studying at the time. The two semesters of my Sophomore year I had the two lowest GPA’s I ever had in college. I guess things have a way of lingering longer than they should. I really think I just couldn’t get past the fact that I thought society was telling me,

“You are a FAILURE. You are WORTHLESS. You will amount to NOTHING.”

The summer after my Sophomore year, 2013,  I went back home to Valparaiso. I was relieved to get out of the hectic environment I had created for myself at Purdue, an environment where I was most definitely NOT successful.

“Life has a funny way of kicking you when you are down.”

That summer after my Sophomore year I was arrested AGAIN. Again, I spent the night in jail. This time it was for minor in consumption, or underage drinking. What can I say, I was a stupid 20-year-old and that 20 year old’s make mistakes. There was something about this event, that seemed to change me more than ANYTHING else. Which doesn’t make much sense. This time I learned a lesson, again. Maybe it was to be careful who you trust. This event was completely written off in my mind, for whatever reason I started to tell myself,

“Maybe I am a failure. The best thing a failure can do is to make changes, try again, and hope for a better outcome.”

As I started my Junior year at Purdue, the good times finally came. I made changes, I tried again, and I received a better outcome and better outcomes to come. The Fall 2013 semester I received straight A’s, and had doubled my GPA from the previous semester. I have had continued success since my last BIG failure when I was 20.

Today, I am looking at law schools to attend next year. It was a long time goal of mine to go to law school, but one that I did not think was achievable when my train was derailed just a few years ago. I know how lucky I am to be where I am right now. I hope that these words can reach someone who has failed, but is still TRYING to succeed. That’s my life’s story, and I am just willing to admit the facts.

To conclude, if life is like being dealt a hand of cards, I may have had some shitty cards dealt my way: Matt died, I was arrested twice, I had a horrible year of school grade-wise. But I also had some great cards dealt my way: A loving and supportive family, great friends, an incredible internship opportunity, the opportunity to remember my friend Matt- through the Matthew Lee Erickson Scholarship, a degree from Purdue University, accepted to two law schools, countless opportunities that I did take advantage of, and countless opportunities that I should have taken advantage of and didn’t. I feel as if I have used those bad cards and made something good out of it all, and that’s all I can continue to do. No Excuses.

If you would like to support a great cause, The Matthew Lee Erickson Scholarship Fund, in memory of my late friend Matt, Check us out on Go Fund Me: http://www.gofundme.com/MLEScholarshipFund

Julian Treasure: Speaking so Others will Listen

Video Link (9:58): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIho2S0ZahI

I think the two most important aspects of leadership are speaking and listening. The better you can do both, the more you will understand and the more you will be understood. As one of Covey’s most important rules, seek to understand before seeking to be understood. Julian Treasure talks about the importance of speaking so that people will listen to you.

First, Julian Treasure outlines 7 negative speaking habits for people to avoid. Most importantly, to be a leader, one must avoid these 7 negatives- gossiping, judging, negativity, complaining, making excuses, lying, and dogmatism. All of these seem relevant to speaking and listening, but most important to leadership is dogmatism. It is explained as having it “my way”, which everyone is guilty of in some way. As a leader, I think it is important to put other people first. Followers are more important than leaders because there are more followers than leaders.

Next, Julian Treasure talks about his acronym HAIL. The definition of the word hail is to greet or acclaim enthusiastically. H stands for honesty. Honesty is important because without trust, a relationship does not really exist. A stands for authenticity. Authenticity is important because people want to see other people being themselves, not trying to be something they are not. I stands for integrity. Integrity is important because you have to do what you say, you can’t make promises and then not show up. L stands for love. Love other people by showing them that you really wish them well. As a leader, you have to want other people to succeed.

:Lastly, Julian Treasure gives 6 vocal exercises to warm up vocal chords. I will be using these before my next presentation, they seem very helpful.

John Wooden: Winning and Success

Video Link (17:37): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MM-psvqiG8

John Wooden defines success as being peace of mind from the self satisfaction of knowing you did the best you possibly could. As a competitor, I know this feeling well. I have been a part of losses, where it felt like the team lost because some players did not give their full effort. However, I have also lost games thinking that my team played the best we could possibly play. Although I would rather win all the time, when I do lose I would prefer to feel like I did my best. If there is one thing I know about myself, it is that I am either 100% involved or 100% not involved. When I lose, I want to feel like I gave 100%, but also that I got 100% production out of my team. Anything less and I will know we gave away a victory.

Wooden talks about the difference between reputation and character. Reputation is what other people see you to be, and character is what you really are. In success and winning, it is important to have a both. You are not going to get better and continue to succeed if you do not have good character, you will not be able to deal with the failure and the losses. A reputation is important if you want to be liked. I would think that having a bad reputation would hurt your chances of succeeding because people don’t like you. If people don’t like you, they most definitely don’t want you to win and succeed.

Wooden has a couple rules in 3. The first list of 3 rules are never be late, don’t use profanity, and never criticize a teammate. Although these rules come from many decades ago, I think they still apply. I never like to be late, and I think it is very important to not only be on time, but be early. I think it is disrespectful to be late to anything. I cannot believe that I have showed up to interviews early before, only to wait for the person interviewing me because they were late.Those companies must not value time like I do. I think it is important to not use profanity around certain people. As a general rule,  I would not use profanity around people I do not know well. However, if I know them well or if they use profanity, I may be more inclined to do so. Lastly, I think it is extremely important to never criticize a teammate. It is important to never criticize anyone, because you may not know their life experiences. As a culture, we criticize too much. Wooden’s second list of 3 rules are don’t whine, don’ t complain, and don’t make excuses. Seems fitting for leadership and responsibility.

Towards the end of the video clip, Wooden says a good quote, “the journey is better than the end.” I find this to be true, the thrill is usually in the hard work. It seems as if all of the great accomplishments in my life were more about the hard work that I put in, and not that good feeling of success at the end. In fact, that good feeling doesn’t even last that long. Looking back at the memories, I think more about the time I spent working on something then the end result of it.

Mark Cuban’s Advice

Video Link (5:01): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgdNTzul27k

Mark Cuban seems to be one of the most popular people in business today. He owns an NBA team, the Dallas Mavericks, and is on Shark Tank. He is a rare celebrity businessman, and many people want to know what he thinks and how he became successful. In this video clip, Cuban gives advice to high school graduates and college graduates.

Mark Cuban’s advice to high school graduates is to go to the cheapest college possible for freshman year and possibly sophomore year. I think this is great advice. If I could do it all over again, I would maybe have done this. When I was a freshmen and sophomore here at Purdue, I was an accounting student and I was not motivated to succeed. Looking back, the first two years out of high school were the most difficult years of my life. I could have benefited from still living with my parents and attending a community college. However, this was not an option for me at the time.

Mark Cuban then goes on to talk about how much debt students can incur in college. I agree with his views that college is getting to be quite expensive. I am proud that Mitch Daniels froze tuition costs, so Purdue is at least attempting to solve the problem. They are not adding more fuel to the fire. However, I am currently looking at law schools, and some are ridiculously expensive. Some do offer scholarships, but the schools range from $19,000 to $50,000 per year, for 3 years. There is a chance that I could be over $150,000 in debt after graduating from law school, if I do not receive any scholarships. There are ways of dropping the debt, such as working a government job or for a non-profit organization for 10 years, something I may end up doing.

Mark Cuban gives advice to college graduates. As I am about to graduate in less than a month, I found his advice helpful. He says that you don’t need the perfect job, and when I was looking for jobs, I may have been looking for the perfect one. I never found it. He then goes on to say that there is no way that the 30 year old you, or the 25 year old you, is going to look back at the 22 year old you and say that guy had it all together. I hope this is the case. It is very difficult to have a life mission at 22 years old. I believe it is important to have a life mission, but so many things are dictated from external factors. You may want to live in one area, but be offered an incredible job in a different area. You may want to work in one industry, but be a failure in that industry. You might fall into something you didn’t even know about. There are so many unpredictable outcomes in the world.

In 3 years, I know I will be thinking much differently than I do today. I know that because 3 years ago, when I was 19, I was thinking much differently than I do today. It’s such a large change in thinking, that I could not have even predicted it. However, it’s the journey that matters. The life experiences that I had along the way. When I was 19, I thought about possibly going to law school. That idea went away for the next few years, however. Last summer, as a sales intern, I realized that I might not want to be a sales person. It was more something that I just fell into. I could succeed at it, but I might not be happy being a sales person. Then, I was led back to the idea of being a lawyer. I went through the whole process of taking the LSAT, applying to law schools, and getting letters of recommendation. I recently was accepted to NIU law school, despite the odds against me. In my eyes, everything has a way of working itself out in the end. I really believe that everything in my life has happened for a reason.

Bill Clinton on Leadership

Video link(1:42): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9b1OnUJOA8Q

Bill Clinton has always been an interesting leader and person to me. Despite scandal after scandal, former President Clinton always seemed to make it right. He is one of the more charismatic politicians in the recent era, and he wasn’t born in to it. He rose quickly the political ranks in Arkansas in the late 1970’s and eventually was elected to be the youngest governor in Arkansas history. He was also the youngest ex-governor in Arkansas history. He ran for governor again and won, and then became president. Bill Clinton is also the only president of the USA that I have ever met, and maybe that’s why I seem to respect his opinion more.

In the video clip, Clinton talks about leadership as continuing in the face of failure. He says that leadership is a state of mind, not just a place in a hierarchy. Clinton makes the point that an ordinary person, with a deep conviction, can make an extraordinary impact on the well-being of society. I find this to be true. Clinton goes on to say that he needs to find more people like that to help his humanitarian causes. Although I like everything that Clinton says, I think the most important piece is what he says about continuing in the face of failure. He talks about persistence and the importance of not giving up on a cause. As leaders, and as followers and people, being persistence is one of the most important traits a person can have. If you want something, or anything, you will most likely not get it on your first try. All of us are then faced with the choice, are we going to give up or are we going to try again. I think that most people will try again, given the opportunity of a second chance, or even a third, fourth, or fifth chance. However, some people give up due to the circumstances. Giving up can happen for a number of reasons, and I have seen too much of it around my life- suicide, failing out of school, closing out society. Nobody likes to fail, and my thought is that failures are misunderstood. There’s something more going on that might miss the eye. Understanding why you or someone you know failed is maybe more important than knowing why you were successful. If a few things can be pinpointed as reason for the failure, the process of change can be started. Look at me, I went from a back row (near) failure, to a straight A student. I was able to accept that fact that things were not going right and I needed to make a change. I went from sitting in the back row, to sitting in the front row. I stopped skipping classes, and I started attending classes. My life feels characterized by the failures, or mishaps, I have experienced; and in that way, I think I am similar to Mr. Clinton

Of all people, I would think Bill Clinton should understand why an ordinary person can make such an extraordinary impact. Bill Clinton is really just an ordinary person. He was born in a poor Arkansas town and his father died before he was born. There were plenty of people around Bill Clinton that didn’t make it and weren’t successful, and Bill Clinton went on to become the president of the USA. The example that Clinton gives in the clip, sounds somewhat similar to his own story. Of course Clinton did not have HIV, but he did have the want to want to be in public service. He wanted to make a difference, even though he was just an ordinary person. He learned how to adapt to his surroundings.