Introspection is an important action that should be performed regularly to provide context to your life, allowing you to understand why you are doing certain things and refresh yourself on your goals, and prioritize what is being done. Prof. Hill framed certain events or milestones in his life as moments where he contemplated what he had done so far and such. Such moments can be done randomly on a Sunday morning while drinking coffee, after a life-altering event, good or bad, or a certain object or experience that triggers such rumination. I have the (mis)fortune of not having any life-altering events yet so I can’t necessarily speak on that front, but there are certain things or settings that cause me to slow down and just think. One of these things is sitting down at a table while I may be doing homework or studying at the library. This moment is enhanced so to speak if I am next to a window as well. It is easy to lose one’s sense of time and awareness when doing some task with utter focus, but if I break that focus, e.g., yawning, needing to stretch, then I often find myself staring out the window for a period of time (hopefully short). This is when I usually reflect what have I done so far this week. If I am not particularly busy, that frame of reference can be extended to a larger period of time. I often think to myself, what is the point of doing this? Am I doing something or not doing something that I may regret in the future due to the loss of opportunity? Or perhaps something completely irrelevant to what I am doing at hand or inane. For example, recently I have been thinking about how I don’t have enough pictures from my time at Cornell. In the future, will my memory of Cornell and what had transpired during then be enough or would I need photos of my favorite spots to relax at or buildings where I spend most of time for lectures and discussions for visual triggers and stimuli? For me, thinking about what I am doing helps me motivate myself or think of ways to improve what I am doing. This period of introspection matters to me and if I have to interrupt working on a major assignment due in 14 hours for this moment of introspection,  I will want to do it. The present moves by too fast to not slow down and not do anything for a short period of time. This seems simple and obvious, but you would be surprised how I have to take steps to ensure it happens.

This leads to my second thing being that writing matters to me. Now this doesn’t mean that I write stories or novels but simply the act of writing, or more accurately, journaling. It could be anything, from a personal TV/movie review, food review or a random idea that I thought of when walking to class. I like to log my experiences because things are ephemeral. The emotions that you feel, the ideas that you come up with, the realizations you come to all don’t last long and certainly don’t stay in your memory for very long. I may have a habit of rewatching movies but watching something for the first time is distinct and may be more valuable than what I might think in subsequent watches; capturing that with pen/paper, or typically digitally, allows me to archive that forever. Journaling allows me to store everything in my brain in a format that I can look back on and reflect upon without losing any fidelity. I encourage others to find a set time everyday during some activity you think you do regularly and just spend a few minutes reflecting. I also encourage others to try and keep a journal. You don’t need to write much or think much, just write something down. I feel that it might make you feel liberated and manifesting your thoughts into actual words can give a different angle to analyze and consider things.