16.

A risk taken in my life was to stay with my boyfriend who is in the marines. Being attached to him because I had known him since 9^th grade and becoming my best friend later on in 10^th grade made it harder. He was always there for me when I felt I had lost everything and also when I felt lonely. The day he chooses to leave was unexpected and I was unprepared for it because he was scheduled to leave four months later. He called me to tell me he had only a couple hours until he had to say goodbye for three months. Everything happened so fast that day I could not set into the reality of him leaving, until he was gone. Staying with him instead of moving on was one of hardest experiences and decisions I had made because I was unprepared.

I had just lost my girl best friend who I would go everywhere with, later finding friendship in him, I had to completely separate form him, I felt lonely. I knew I had other good friends but they were not the people I could share memories with. I would constantly think about him worried because time a mysterious and no one knows what will happen during 3 months. I was completely lonely I had no one to relate to, no one to comfort me or who understood me. I did not want to break up with him because I knew I would not find someone as respectful as he is and knowing how other guys are I knew their could not be someone like him. I wanted to just focus on personal improvement when he left, but I was afraid that if I wouldn’t think of him I would forget about our memories and connection would fade away. I did it anyways but I would have a good time at school being distracted from him, but when I got home I was drowned in his memories. I sat for the first month in my room after school crying until my eyes looked swollen, and at times I felt anger because he had chosen to leave and I felt he did not consider my feelings. Most people told me I would not be able to do it however, I continued working on myself and continued with my life knowing he would constantly be leaving

1.

Red is described as the color of eternal love, hate, and pain which are all deep emotions.

Red is a powerful color used to feel things abundantly. In love, red is the highest last stage to describe how intense your love is for someone. It is roses or flowers given to you as a thank you or appreciation showing someone truly cares. It is the feeling of butterflies in your stomach when you get your first kiss, the warmth in your heart. It is your heart beating faster racing for love, your lungs gasping for love. Red is romance.

            Red is also evil which turns to hate, it is the troubles of the world. It is extreme anger in your heart that deprives you from happiness. It is a gallon of hate being poured inside your body. The feeling of heat running accelerating through your veins causing you to shake. It is the sound of whispers in your head calling for revenge. Red is flames in your soul. It is burning, hot, danger, when trouble comes your way. Pain, an uncomfortable pinch in your skin. It is a red liquid oozing out of your skin, out of an open soar, a cut. It is fear, sweat dripping from your face. Red, it is an extreme emotion.

2.

Competition is healthy when it pushes people to do their best efforts into getting something and makes you aware of what you are capable of doing. However competition becomes unhealthy when a person becomes carried away and risks everything they have in order to be able to beat everyone else. Competition is faced during our lives most of the time and is difficult to be avoided. It can be competing for a job, a spot in college, a trophy, a person, or a spot in a school play. I believe it is something in our nature we do to survive or obtain what we want in life like animals compete for food mates and power.

Competition becomes unhealthy though when it turns you back to people you love, and when it brings out the worst in the competitors. Cheating for example can be a result of wanting to win a competition and can start problems within the competitors because it is unfair. A negative result of competition is betrayal. When “best friends” are competing for the same guy they will at one point turn their backs to each other because one of them will end up losing to the other one. This can affect self-esteem as well because the person loosing may wonder why they lost and become self-conscious by comparing themselves to the person who won. Hate can also be developed when competitors have lost and can be expressed through revenge. The girl loosing who competed with her best friend to get a certain guy might seek revenge and try to betray her friend by trying to steal the guy or making him cheat on her.

Competition is not always unhealthy but can become a negative experience when it brings out the worst in competitors, creates more problems, and divides relationships.

3.

The articles and videos we have read and watched during class are eye opening to the problems of our society. I have taken one of the videos about beauty and compared it with our community and people in my school. The video about what the perception of beauty in the United States is, demonstrates beauty is secretly being used as a weapon towards woman, lowering woman,and making them seem like objects through the media. This causes men to be lead into liking a woman because of their appearance more than personality and develops a relationship based on looks which can lead to negative results like mistreating woman. Men learning to treat woman as an object could not take the relationship seriously and not have feelings for their girlfriend or wife because they mostly are led by an appearance which can develop an abusive relationship.

During school I have noticed many guys are interested only in girls who are attractive or closer to what the media shows to be attracting. What is wrong about this is that they only go out with them because they are pretty but do not know how their personality is. Many guys I’ve heard talk about their girlfriends and just say how “hot” their body is “or how she has “a big butt or breast” or also exposing what they’ve done with them and out loud, but I have never heard any positive comments about their personality. Me who are influenced by the media and have set their standards by it have shown to not be respectful to woman and since it will become worst men will lose respect for woman causing more murder or conflicts because they are degrading woman.

4.

If I could choose to be anyone in history I would not want to be a different person, but I would like to be alive at the time Jesus alive in earth and teaching about God and how to obtain salvation. I would have liked to be a part of his followers because since I enjoy studying the bible and find the bible correct when it comes to teaching about the state of mind of men and also shows to be “beneficial for teaching, for reproving...” Being Jesus’ follower would make me capable of learning further about the mysteries in the bible.

Being alive around Jesus’ time and being one of his followers would teach you as well about what are the best decisions to take, and to live your life in order to be happy. If I would have any questions about what the bibles scriptures say, I would not have to worry about getting the wrong perception because I would be able to get the correct answer form Jesus. Jesus would also help us find happiness and calamity in ourselves he would give us advice we could not doubt because they would.

Another of the experiences I would get from being a follower of Jesus is being able to witness the incredible things he has done which are recited in the bible. I would go back to that time to witness of many of the prophecies that have come true and to be able to understand  why they happened and analyze them carefully because being there you are able to I would also be able to help people know about God so they can have some type of guidance in their lives. Going back in time and be a follower of Jesus and talk to him would be an experience that would help me understand the teachings of the bible. 

5.

Half of $1 million dollars would be wisely spent in Haiti to help recover from the earthquake in 2010, and the other half would go to educating poor areas in Africa, about the importance of sex education.

Haiti has not yet recovered from the destruction the earthquake and needs as much financial aid as they can obtain in order to feed the population. Trash and unnecessary debris are covering the affected areas Medicine is needed to cure people that were affected by the pollution and materials are needed to clean areas affected by dead bodies. There is scarcity of food which is forcing people to turn violence to obtain food to survive. Therefore aiding Haiti with half a million dollars would calm violence and feed the starving children and affected people of the earthquake.

Africa would benefit from sex education because each year the birthrates are escalading and more people are affected with HIV as well as other sexually transmitted diseases. While birthrates are increasing the number of people who are not able to sustain family’s needs is increasing as well. More families are dealing with more kids and need more food and water to survive. Since purified water is not at reach of most families in Africa many children and elderly are being affected the most and die as result of dehydration or drinking polluted water. Educating African kids as well as adults would bring awareness of the consequences sexual activity may have for them as well as the responsibility they will confront by reproducing at a high rate.

6.

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 A personal change I made was being able to focus more in school in order to get higher grades. I started to use my time wisely by not talking to people when I had work to get done. It was boring at first because I would be tempted to leave my work and just go talk to someone. Other times the people that sat around me would start telling me a story or something that had happened to them and I did not want to be rude or mean so I just tried to do my work and talk at the same time. It would not always work out though because I am not good at doing multiple tasks at the same time.

I also achieved raising my grades by focusing on the lessons teachers gave us and asked more questions for classes I had done as well as I wanted to the previous year. In math class I chose to sit at the first row of desks so I could be attentive throughout the class period and not be distracted by looking at the students in front of me if I sat in the back.

Doing my homework for all classes everyday also helped me keep the information memorized in my head. I spent around five hours every day completing homework assignments and also reading some of the text book lessons helped me stay ahead of the work teachers gave me. Studying before tests was essential to raise my grades because it was another way to refresh my memory and be prepared.