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Actually for individual evolution, I have a lot to say about myself. Before coming to Bryn Mawr, I didn't know what the writing seminar really is, since I have never had a writing seminar back in Singapore. What I knew about the writing seminar is just another name of the English writing course. I did not really expect much from this course. To be honest, I do not have confidence in writing and writing is always a burden to me. Moreover, I am nervous of speaking English in front of others, since I always think that I have a different accent from my American classmates.

However, after taking the course, I found that all of my previous perceptions are wrong. I am really benefited from different ideas learnt from group discussions every week. Previously, I always thought myself as a science student which means that I cannot study philosophy or do critical and abstract thinking. I prefer scientific theories ( Haha, are they just stories created by scientists to help us human beings understand the world?), since they are just facts which are clear and direct for me to comprehend. Moreover, I have never questioned the reliabilities of these theories since they are proved to be accurate and I can tell that they are correct by studying and analyzing the data collected by scientists. However, this does not mean that after taking the course, I do not believe these theories any more. If so, I can just give up studying. Since everything is just a story, there is no need for me to waste my time and money to study and understand “stories”. I appreciate the scientific way of understanding the world and everything around us. But at the same time, I start accepting other approaches of understanding the universe and earth, since it is logical for me to understand where these seemingly scientifically wrong ideas come from. I am really happy to see the change in myself. In order to expand my own understanding of the world, I need to be eclectic. I think I am not as narrow-minded as before, even though I still do not believe in any God or creation myths.

Besides the change in the mindset, I also managed to find my interest in the study of brain. Not really much about the brain as the site of story construction, but “magics” that our brains can do. I am really interested in the study of the conscious and the unconscious part of the brain, where our unconscious feelings, perceptions, phobias come from. It is also interesting to play with the optical illusions and analyzed the reasons behind them. Hence, this writing seminar to me is not just about writing, but also about science( Haha, my favorite).

Most importantly, I find that writing essays of my interested topics are not painful any more. I think it is really important to me since I found a new way to communicate my inner self with others. I know this may sound a little like cliché. However, writing was really a big problem to me. I cannot write well even in Chinese.( Sorry, but that's true!) Now, I start realizing why some people like writing a lot. Sitting quietly with a cup of coffee and trying to talk to and understand myself actually can be a leisure to me. I enjoy the process of writing now, since it is a new way for me to conduct self-reflection which I think is important for people with busy lifestyles. We sometimes need to talk to ourselves and understand what our purposes are and where our goals lie. By doing so, we would never lose the motivation to move on and achieve.

As what Elisa said that in her post , the course is going to end soon and it is the time to say goodbye. I am also afraid of getting out of this comfort zone, since it takes really long for me to get to know new people. I really like our esem course Each one of us is so different that we always have something to share. Paul is always the one who bring us back to the main idea when we turned to discuss something else. Julie is always the one who summarizes the important ideas from our sometimes quite random discussions. Mattie is always the one who has “big” ideas. Haha, Carolina likes to argue sometimes and always says “ Oh, I don't know. You guys understand what am I saying?” Eva always speaks at a very low voice and has those abstract ideas. Elisa always has many personal stories to share. Even though that Angela and Jordan are pretty quiet during the class, their online posts are always thought-provoking. Val is always very cool, sporty and she could always bring laughters. Ilana (Haha, I always think that she looks like Jacob's sister ) always likes to raise hands to express her ideas. Moreover, Genesis can always relate our topics to arts which I think she is really good at. Haha, Hilary is the only girl who has red hair. Kayla is another cool girl in our class. Last but not least, Christine is always the one who likes to drink the vitamin juice.

I think I write too much. I really like everyone in our seminar group and I learned a lot from each one of you. Our seminar would not be so successful without anyone of you.