First Year Reflection

On coming to college, and specifically the honors program, I expected to build up a community of many tightly knit and similarly minded people. Over the course of my first year, I attempted to reach out and form connections with my fellow honors freshmen, but as I did so, I learned that I still hold value in smaller groups of closer friends rather than larger crowds. So I put my effort into the connections I made and grew those relationships, and even though I came into the honors community with hopes of a grand scale community, I found that there is often more worth in investing into closer friendships. 
When I joined the honors community, I already had a pretty good idea of what I wanted my career to be: I would work on finding a way to treat and cure the mental disorders that plague so many people. Moving forward into my first year, I developed and focused my goals into a more tangible set of plans for my future. I learned that hardly anyone works on all aspects of a particular project, especially in engineering. What actually happens is that people will specialize in a particular area and use their expertise in that area to contribute to the greater project. I realized that the main problem I wanted to tackle, at least at first, was the lack of development in brain imaging, and I would set this as my primary goal. In the honors program overall, I learned that there are many pieces to the puzzle, but we don’t have to be all of them. 
During my first year in honors, I was not yet assigned a specific major, being in the college of engineering, and I had to pass through several basic general engineering courses before I could properly declare a major. It often felt as though what I was doing was just another bridge to cross before the green pastures of fulfilling coursework. However, I reinforced the idea that these courses were preparation for what is to come, and if I could do well in these courses, then those to follow will have a sound foundation. Without the honors program, I would have not been able to secure a solid foundation, for in regular level classes, I would have had no challenge, no push to strive for better, but because of honors, and the benefits of being in this community, I could find that challenge to prepare me for my future coursework and full major. 
In college, I had wanted to get involved in research in some way, but I had no idea what that would look like or how I would put it into practice. The honors program has offered several opportunities to find out about research and the many ways I could get involved. Because of these, I have focused my research wishes into a practical and tangible plan, and so I decided to pursue a certificate in biomedical research to compliment my biomedical engineering major. I wanted to find a pursuit that would challenge me and give me an outlet to fulfill my goals, in which I could prepare myself for the future ahead of me. 
In my definition, a life well lived does not mean that every goal has been completely accomplished, but that I have put forth goals, and I have worked to the best of my ability to complete them. I may run out of time, space, or resources before my goals are completed, but when that comes, I want to look back and see all that has been accomplished. A life well lived is not what you do, but how you do it. 
I decided to work with mental disorders because I want to help people, and to do so requires that I search for the root of the problem. I feel that the problem is not truly solved until all the roots have been removed. Therefore, I chose to pursue a biomedical engineering degree that I may search for and attack the problem at the roots. Long term, I hope to help people who suffer from depression specifically, and I want to do so in the best way possible. This requires me to do the best that I can in whatever stage of life I reside, so that I may use my gifts and my talents to serve. I have the opportunity in these areas to give my work to those who need it, in that I could help someone see relief from a mental disorder from which they had suffered for years. However, the challenges lie in finding the problem and then attacking it head on. If the problem is not completely confronted and solved, how can that be called a job well done or perfectly fine? When faced with challenges in this field, the work must be done to effectively and efficiently complete each task, lest the problem resurface in a new, more challenging way.
All in all, the choices that I make today and in the future will shape my plans for the days to come. In order to fulfill my life well lived, my choices made to pursue biomedical engineering, to secure a certificate in biomedical research, and my signature capstone work must be performed at my best, for if I choose to take the easy route, I will not be prepared for a life of problem solving, for a life of service to those who need it. I must be prepared to make sacrifices, to put in hard work, to make the best product I can, because if I do not, how can I say I lived life well?