Identity and Values

This is an introduction of myself and my values and probably one of the most difficult things for me to write about.

Explain a situation where you have made an ethical decision. Discuss how you weighed up the values involved in that decision, the decision you made, and how you reflect on the decision now.

I think one of the more difficult ethical decisions I had to make was moving to New Zealand. I was 27 at the time when I initially started thinking about moving abroad, and it was a toss up between New Zealand and Canada. We had a lot of discussions about this with my partner at the time, and we were making plans to move over and start a family together. Unfortunately, we did not have an opportunity to move together due to financial costraints, so we decided that I would be the first one to go, since I had previous experience living abroad and would likely have more success integrating into a new country and finding a place for us. Unfortunately, as it often happens with couples when distance is involved, when the opportunity presented itself to reunite, my partner got cold feet and didn't want to abandon her friends and family. I had to make a decision to stay or go back and it was a difficult choice, but I wanted this new life and stuck to the plan that I had been mulling over for years before. And here I am, 10 years later, starting a new journey to a new dream. Moving forward with no regrets, but staying true to my goals.

Describe how your culture and the people around you have influenced your values and identity.

I believe a person's values and identity are influenced a lot by their surroundings, but the biggest impact in my opinion comes from the parents. If the parents fail, the next biggest contributor is whatever environment the child finds him or herself in. In my case, my biological parents are divorced, but my step father has been a great influence and shining beacon of what a man should be, although I think that I still fall short of his expectations sometimes. He has taught me a lot of things that I, being a teenager at the time, would probably never had learnt given the general outlook of the society I came from. Together with my mother, they have shown me what a true loving family can be, and what two people can achieve by supporting and guiding each other along the way, together.

Identify your strengths and how they will support you during your learning journey.

I actually did the Clifthon Strengths test a few years ago when I was stuck for a bit, and even though I was generally skeptical of the test, after reading through the report and reflecting on my own experience, I was convinced, so I will brazenly steal some excerpts from it. My signature strengths are as follows:

• Ideation: I am fascinated by ideas. It can be a concept, an explanation of an event or situation. It can be a connection between obscure and disparate phenomena. It can be a new perspective on a familiar challenge. This always helps me to look at things from outside the box, find new approaches to a puzzle, be open to new things.
• Adaptability: I live in the moment and I can be very spontaneous. This doesn't mean that I do not have a plan, I probably do, but I am open to making adjustments on the fly and changing my vector when necessary, perhaps to avoid an impassable wall, perhaps to find a better pasture. I believe this is very helpful when encountering unexpected situations, when things are going compeltely out of whack.
• Intellection: I like to think, about everything really. It can be focused mental activity, breaking down a problem into solvable chunks or developing an idea, but can also completely lack focus. I do not shy from company, but I enjoy my time alone just as much if not more, as I can muse to myself and come up with new things, be they smart or completely unrelated to a problem at hand.
• I am a Learner: I love absorbing knowledge. The matter that interests me most will always draw attention from me, but I am mostly drawn to the process, rather than the content or the end result. This can be a blessing and a curse, because on the one hand, it certainly helps me to easily broaden my knowledge about things that I am actively engaged in, be it a project I am working on or a topic I am researching, but on the other, it also helps me retain sometimes completely useless information that I was curious about on a whim, and spent maybe 5 minutes looking at, and then randomly remembering it years down the line and thinking - why do I even know this?

Evaluate your limitations in terms of your learning and career development. How might these affect your learning journey?

My biggest initial limitation is that I am working full-time during the foundations part of this course, however, this should be resolved by the time the Bootcamp proper will begin. I have resigned from my job for this opportunity and I will commit the maximum of my time to absorb as much as I can. I hope that this, along with my stregths, will help me overcome any shortcomings I might not be aware of.

Share an example of when you were trying to work productively with others, but there was resistance or tension. Discuss strategies you tried at the time, how effective they were, and your reflections on what other strategies you would try now and why.

I have previously worked on group projects during my university years and game jams. Game jams are probably more prone to conflicting sistuations as there are a lot of limitations that the team has to deal with usually. This, along with time constraints, can lead to stress, which in turn causes tensions and irritability when creative disagreements arise. I always believed that one of the best approaches is to get everyone heard and listened to. Even an "obviously" silly idea can be worth exploring, if only to be proven wrong but in the process - alleviating possible regrets or self-doubt. Even an "obviously" great idea can turn out to be dull and boring when implemented. Both can be the opposites, really. Usually, a democratic approach of "lets all try this and can it if it doesn't work" is a good level ground to start from, but some people only want to watch the world burn. And in those cases it is just better for the team to let them go instead of poisoning the air and sabotaging everyone else.