The reading for me so far is going good. I believe the strengths
of the book to be that each person's story isn't very long so you get to keep
moving on and learning about new people. While reading other books I find
myself counting the pages until the next chapter so that I know when the
incredibly boring chapter will be over but with this book I don't have to do
that because I know there's only a few pages on each person. I guess I find the
weaknesses of the book to be that some of the people aren't as interesting as
the others but that's only a matter of opinion. I actually enjoy reading
holding on. Most of the stories I’ve read so far are extremely interesting and
it takes me back in time to really get how they were feeling and the hardships
they dealt with. To be completely honest I haven't been active reading. I
haven't taken a single note off to the side and I should probably start doing
that.
The theme I found in these stories so far
is "Fear as protection or fear as trap". Fear can protect you
in some cases because if you're afraid to do something and it ends up being
beneficial in the end it was a win, win because you didn't have to face your
fear and you benefited from it. Fear can also be a trap because if you decide
to face your fear the out come may not be what you had hoped for and in result
giving you more fear. In Harold C. Cottons story he owned Bob's hat shop after
the original owner died. He had started there when he was a teenager and shined
people's shoes on the street until eventually all of the owners before him
passed away and he got to take over the shop. Running a business is extremely
hard and very stressful but working there was something Harold loved doing so
he wouldn't let fear keep him from doing what he loved. He even took it as far
as letting colored people to sit in the seats next to the white people to get
their shoes shined. What if the whites stopped coming because they didn't want
their shoes shined next to colored people? What if eventually he had no
business coming in until he had to shut the place down. Those were all things
that could happen but he chose to do it anyway in hopes it would end with
everyone happy. He wasn't going to let fear trap him into only having white
business, by doing this he's getting more business.
I'm extremely afraid of heights, but the
rock climbing class here at Osu sounded really fun and an easy credit to get. I
thought to myself, "how high can this wall even be, the student center
isn't very big". So I joined the class and prepared myself mentally for
the worst. I wasn't going to let fear trap me from joining certain classes and
experiencing knew things in life. When I got all tied in and my partner was
ready to belay, I began climbing. I got maybe half way up the wall and I
noticed my rope wasn't as tight as it should've been and it was progressively
getting looser. I told my partner to bring me down because I was more than
afraid to stay up on the wall with an unsecure rope. When I got back down on
the ground my professor checked the rope and said I was right to come back down
because if I would've stayed up on the wall it would have ended badly. In the
end my fear was protection to my safety but I won't let my fear trap me into
not going back onto the wall. That class was one of my favorites so far and I’m
now certified to climb any wall!
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