My Future and Other Woes (LJ 3/5)

Personality insight: I am a dramatic stressor as in if I get a tinny bit stressed-whoosh! All is lost. So this past week has been crazy (pronounced k-ray-zee with three syllables, please).  As a result, I have been flipping out about England. Should I even be going? I could just stay in Provo, get another project, save money. In short, I could just be responsible. And my project still feels like it's in limbo. Everything from the statistics to the communication is murky. Especially daunting was filling out the IRB proposal on Friday. I left waving my white flag. 

Then I got to thinking of why I wanted to do a field study. Yes, it was mostly composed of selfish reasons (i. e. visiting the British Museum, seeing London again, etc.), but there were some academic concerns as well. And I feel a field study is more than just a project in another place. Looking through the past readings especially "What Students Don't Learn Abroad" and "Culture Blends," I realized that what I will learn abroad is worth the pain of working on assignments and IRB approval. Gaining new perspectives and intuitions for life and statistics is worth writing one more learning journal.

In conclusion, I decide not to throw in the towel and to refocus on my project. My mentor is not back from New Mexico yet, but I can start by filling out scholarships and emailing Dr. Woods (which frightens me a bit; yeah don't ask). For the communication portion, I will be focusing on BYU and Southamptons academic communication, not necessarily foreign communication in general.