If you could make a video as a message to your past self, what would you say? What would be the main theme of your video, the main message? (such as: wear sunscreen.) What approach would you take with yourself? Would you tell yourself the advice in a straight-forward way, or would your past self take some convincing? What kind of visuals would you use? What would be some minor themes to support your major theme?
Try to keep your responses to approximately 200 words. Take your time to think about the answers.
Answer the initial prompt by Wednesday, September 18, midnight. Respond to a classmate by Friday, September 20, midnight.
Response: Ask your classmate a question about his/her post. The question should continue to be respectful, and should provoke your classmate to think more deeply about the message s/he is sending to him/herself.
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ReplyDeleteIf I could make a video to my past self I would tell me not to waste precious time on frivolous things. The theme would be work hard and put forth full effort into everything you set out to accomplish. My approach would be straight forward, I would explain to myself the consequences if I do not take my advice. As for visuals I would show my past me the beautiful family I will have and the home I will buy from my successful Law practice. Some minor themes I would use would be to show myself the fantastic progress I would make each year if I do the things my future me tells me to.
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DeleteThe older and wiser we become (hopefully) the more we realize the importance of time and success. I think most young people have been told to value time and strive for excellence. So my question would be, do you think your message would have had a greater impact on your past self because it was you giving the advice and not a peer or family member?
DeleteIf I could make a video as a message to my past self I would say: go out, have fun, and make the best memories you can. As cliché as it sounds I would love to tell my past self this because I regret more of the things I didn't do than the things I did do. And for my current age to be thinking that already, it’s pretty disappointing. The main theme of my video, the main message would be to take chances. I would take a direct approach with myself because I personally know that would mean business. My past self would need some convincing so I would need to use pictures, songs, and quotes. I would use pictures to compare and contrast, like a picture of a group of friends contrasting to a picture of a mother and her five children. The songs I would use would be those upbeat songs that just get you in a good mood. And the quotes would be deep and meaningful to make me think on another level of things. I would also use real life scenarios to make me open my eyes a little more on the situation, such as if I was to die that day. Would I be happy with all that I accomplished? Or would I be greatly disappointed? I would make my past self see that by not taking the opportunity to have fun now, she might not have the same opportunity in the future to do so. And to take those risky chances because in the end we only regret the changes we didn't take.
ReplyDeleteIf I had to make a video as a message to my past self, I would tell myself to enjoy big moments and let the small things go. The overall message of my video would be that life goes on. I would tell myself that it’s not the end of a world if I get a bad grade on a test or go through a breakup, although my middle school self would probably need a lot of convincing of that. I would emphasize to take in everything about the good times, to remember as much as I could in that moment so I could look back and reminisce. Some visuals I would use would be home videos of my childhood to remind myself of the good memories and the memories that would be awaiting my past self. I’m sure that my past self would need to be convinced of the advice that I am giving, so I might use specific examples of experiences that I’ve had and what I should have done to prove my point. Some minor themes that I would use in my video to support the major theme would be to try and stay positive and motivated.
ReplyDeleteIf you told your past self this important information would you listen to your future self and can you tell yourself this now would you do these things?
DeleteIf I had the opportunity to make a video to my past self I would say not to blame yourself so much. During my parents divorce when I was 9 I blamed myself for their problems, I thought it was entirely my fault. I would consul 9 year old me in the fact that I had nothing to do with it, that sometimes, relationships don't work out. Sometimes people cheat. Sometimes people lose themselves, their own identity, in a gesture to seem more important than they are or a desperate grab at attention. The main theme would be that everyone makes their own choices and that correlation does not imply causation, even when speaking about people and emotion. I would be kind and understanding with 9 year old me. I would be as straight forward as I could, pointing multiple examples throughout history, my friends lives, and my own experience because younger me was definitely smarter than I am now. Some visuals would be the fight my dad and I got into when I was 16 in which it was the first time I saw him cry and confess that he still loved my mother and even begged me for forgiveness. It left me speechless to see my dad be so human, for lack of a better word, when he was always a stone cold hard ass. Minor themes would be much more cheery and humorous, such as be sure and remember to drink more and smoke less. Also to never stop running because that Apollo's belt you had in the Army was damn sexy.
ReplyDeleteYour blog was great; very relatable. What other visuals would you include? Perhaps some of the lighter examples would be a nice touch, depending on the overall feel you want to leave the reader with. A couple of things: "consul", is this a misspelling of "console" or "consult"? And I'm unclear about the sentence, "...that correlation does not imply causation". I also think you shouldn't apologize for the "hard ass" remark and leave out the "lack of a better word." Your writing is very heartfelt and honest, and I love the last sentence! Great job!
DeleteDear Jason,
ReplyDeleteI know you probably don’t like me right now, but in the future we’re actually pretty tight. I understand that you’re talking to this new girl at church. She’s definitely a cutie. Oh, and that song that you wrote her is actually getting re-tweeted on twitter right now. That’s pretty cool. I just wanted to let you know, she’s the one. It’s been a year now, and a lot of things have changed. I know you’re not taking her very seriously because of the age difference, but she’s the girl of your dreams. She’s beautiful, smart, makes you laugh, and legitimately loves you for who you are. In the future you’ll have a beautiful friendship going if you keep it up. The problem is, you made things a little bit rocky at one point. Your negligence will come back to haunt you, and so you know, when you say, “it’s future Jason’s problem,” that is so not considerate. Fighting isn’t fun, and having to clean up after you really stresses me out. She loves you, and you feel you can’t love her, but that’s not the case. You can be with her. I tested the water. So, either make things more difficult for yourself and pick up the pieces of your relationship later, or tell her you love her, and that you’ll always be there for her. You’ll both be happier and you’ll have less sleepless nights.
Love you.
Sincerely, Future Jason
Jason, you may, or may not, have gotten me a little emotional here. Very nice to write about your girl like that, it sounds like an amazing relationship. But don't you think that you should describe what happened to you past self so he doesn't make the same mistake? Might make things a lot easier if there isn't a chance for the same mistake, again!
DeleteWe kind of did this in class today, and I would stick with my initial response. If you don’t do well in school you will end up in the military and hate it. The main theme of my video would be that hard work will result in greater success than having fun. I’d have to take a direct approach with myself and be straight forward if not he’d likely grow bored and move on. Although I’d probably have to convince my past self that it was really me, I’d have to use examples of events that we had already experienced by his viewing age. I’d use pictures of what we go through, what our actual future is like, and how we got here. The ups and the downs that make me feel the way I do now, emphasizing on the regrets to ensure he fully understands the repercussions of the slacking we do throughout high school. I’d let him know that although we have been blessed with numerous things, we can’t enjoy them because of the military. Some of the minor themes would be hard work, you will always have time to have fun, working hard doesn’t mean that you aren’t enjoying life, and the hard work will far outweigh the alternate results. Get it done now, and enjoy life to its fullest potential on the backside of school!
ReplyDeleteI like it! Sounds like you have a lot to write about for your paper. I think this is a deep topic that really affects you, and it'll be cool to see how the story continues. Also, nice punctuation.
DeleteIf I had to make a video message for myself I would say go out with your friends and try all those things you thought about doing. The main theme would be living life so that there are no what if moments because being older and reminiscing “ha-ha, what was I thinking?” is way better than “dang that could’ve been fun.” My main approach to get myself to listen would be to show pictures of myself having fun the last couple years or interview my friends from today. I would say you can have fun too if you get off Xbox and go hang out with people in person since there’s a lot to do outside of a house. As soon as little me saw what real fun looks like I would agree. The minor themes to go with the main one would be listing some activities that are enjoyable like playing sports, talking to girls, and going to the movies.
ReplyDeleteI thought your message was interesting and I liked how you said you'd use pictures or interviews from your friends to price your point. My question is: how would you convince your younger self to have more fun, But also portray how important it is to have fun but remain on track in life?
DeleteIf I could make a video to my past self I would encourage me to enjoy being a kid. Have fun and make the most of a stress free, no responsibilities, and care free child hood. To actually take advantage of getting to do anything that came to mind or seemed as if it would be exciting. To create more of those unique and adventurous memories that only a kid is capable of creating. So that those memories can somehow help get me through the future days of working hard every day and never really having enough time to play. Enjoying the long summers and hanging out with friends or the snowball fights with the occasional white wash given to whoever was the most deserving. I would write a mock schedule to show myself the fast pace and never ending cycle of responsibility.
ReplyDeleteNice message. Do you think that your past self would have listened to what you had to say?
DeleteIf I could make a video as a message to my past self, I’d tell myself to speak my mind when I had something to say. There’s not so much a specific time period I’d direct this message at, just at my younger self in general. There were so many times I kept things bottled up inside when I should’ve just spoke my mind; it would’ve made situations so much easier. In order to get this message across to my past self, I’d explain how detrimental it is to keep things to yourself and let things build up. I’d lay out examples of where I didn’t say something that needed to be said and show myself how different it could’ve ended up. A minor theme I’d use to support my main theme of speaking my mind would be when Mom and Dad got divorced; I should have told them how it made me feel and let them know my concerns about the situation instead of keeping it to myself and losing sleep over it. I’d tell my past self that if I had just talked to them, I would’ve known that the divorce wasn’t my fault and that what was happening between them would be for the best. In order to convince myself of this, I’d tell myself how everyone is doing now and use family pictures or home videos to show myself that despite my parents’ separation, we’re still able to act as a civil family.
ReplyDeleteI really like your message! I can relate to it in many ways. But, do you think your past self would even have the courage to speak her mind? Or would you have to help build her confidence up in the video? Lovely job!
DeleteHi sweet girl,can you please put down your Nancy Drew book and listen to me for a minute? I know you’re twelve now but you’ve got lots of time in the world. You don’t smile much; you’re self-conscious. Eventually, you won’t stop smiling because it’ll be one of your best features. Don’t wait for boys to make you happy. Your crush who sits behind you on the bus? The one who made you cry? You’ll forget his name in a year or so. Learn how to swim; don’t be content with running through the sprinklers. You’ll be the person that’ll love you no matter what, so be your best friend always, especially when you screw up. Take lots of deep breaths, they’ll calm you when you’re nervous. It’s not your fault that dad left mom. He’ll always come for you when you need him. Open those doors in front of you during your life, even if you’re scared to. There’s usually an adventure on the other side.
ReplyDeleteMain message: She doesn’t have to shrink to fit in, don’t be so scared. Being gentle and reassuring might ease her worries. I would be specific with points she could relate to. She’ll be more apt to understand. Lots of pictures and video of young girls, depicting some of the scenes I described. End shot of me as an adult, looking out the window at two girls riding by on their bikes.