Theme 4: Worst Characteristics

Entering college I had a change in character. All of the high school I was in my reputation era. I was constantly trying to prove myself to everyone around me. So I put up walls that protected me from getting hurt. It was really about survival because I somehow managed to pick friends that were not always the most supportive. Being in that environment was toxic, I had gone to school with that group of people for seven years and the school population was small so I had no other choice but to be around them. So their personalities rubbed off on me. The greatest example I have is my current roommate Flor. We went to middle school - high school together and did not become friends until Covid-19 hit. She then would describe me as mean, judgmental , and stubborn.

I was mean because I would not let others in my class have the opportunity to learn. I would immediately cut them off if they were on the wrong track. My go-to phrase was “DUMBASS” when I did not agree with someone. I was selfish because I would get frustrated when they did not know how to do a concept that I found easy. My roommate was the first one that brought this to my attention. I am so grateful to have her because it allowed me to realize that I was not the nicest or easiest person to be around in high school. She explained to me that I judged others because I was being judged.
Another characteristic is being overly judgmental. I never understood why others would take part in participating in illegal substances and never took school seriously. I had constant drama with all the athletes because I was the only one to ever call them out on their actions. Specifically, the male athletes because I was a man-hater. I did not think they belonged to be in the spaces they were taking up. However, I do not regret being mean to them because they were my bullies too. I of course always won every argument because they never had anything valid to say about me other than my looks and that is an immediate loss. But I do regret being judgmental to all the band kids, specifically my roommate and her friends. I remember that I would call them weird and annoying to be around but genuinely I was just following the trend of everyone else.

I still am very stubborn because I want things to go my way. It is something that has taken me the longest to work on which is a characteristic I mainly have around my family. My dad and I are the same people so as much as I love him we fight a lot. He is my biggest hater and supporter. Two examples are I wanted to join the cross country team and become a lifeguard and to my face, he told me I could not do that. “I did not know how to swim or that I was slow” was what he said to me and he's not wrong about being slow but it hurt. My stubborn self did both out of spite. I did not like that people believe that I can not do something because I will do it better. During my lifeguard training, there were six other girls and I was by far one of the weakest swimmers but I challenged myself every day to get my laps in, and out of the six I was one of two that completed the swim qualifications to be a beach lifeguard. Being stubborn is a bad trait because I will do things out of spite or I simply will not do them at all.

So entering college I decided that those traits were not me but other people's actions that were copied. I know I have worked hard to make sure that I am not mean or judgmental to others because it is something that follows you. Especially judge other students in their academic journey because I know how it feels now to be helpless about grades and the future. I want to be that person people feel comfortable going to because they know that I am here to listen and not judge. I probably would not be as disappointed in my past self if I did not have those characteristics. But I think they were necessary to my development as a person now.

I think that my worst characteristic is that I am too hard on myself. I struggle with a lot of issues relating to anxiety, and it makes it so that it is really difficult for me to let my guard down around others. I spend all day thinking about what others think of me, and I have let these thoughts consume me. I really want to be able to help others and make sure everyone enjoys being around me, but I get so anxious about whether or not I am saying the right thing that I often end up saying nothing at all. This has been an issue for as long as I can remember. I grew up in very toxic friendships, and I learned to let my voice be drowned out by others. I am not shy by any means, but when I get in my head, I find myself ignoring all my friends because I get too nervous to respond. I realized last year that this is because I have the mentality that if I choose to say no to plans, I can't let people be disappointed in me. I have found myself doing similar things during pledging. I should be going to as much as I can because I really like all of my pledge brothers and want to get to know them all more, but I feel safer in friendships I have already established. This leads into another one of my bad characteristics. I am really codependent on other people. Because I find it hard to actually feel safe and comfortable around people, I latch on to the people that I do feel comfortable around a bit too much. Thankfully, the closest people in my life understand why I do this and are always there for me, but it made it really difficult to feel like I had a place here. I don't give up easily, but I considered transferring during my first quarter. I felt the same way that I did my freshman year of high school, where I didn't know anyone close enough to call them my closest friends. All of my friends from middle school had gone to the same Catholic high school, and even though I hated being a part of the group that I had been in, I still tried to transfer. I can't stand feeling like I don't have real connections, and I put too much pressure on what other people think of me. I am not completely sure how I can go about working on these issues. For me, my lack of self-confidence with regards to my personality goes farther than being insecure. I have a tendency to take things to the extreme, and some of my personal issues factor into why I can never seem to get out of my head. Still, I have been trying to make a conscious effort to ignore the thoughts which tell me that I should stay inside in case others don’t like me. I want to live more for myself, and I think this is a feasible goal. A big part of reaching this goal would be working to be truly ok with choosing to be alone.

I believe that my worst characteristic is my unwillingness to step outside of my comfort zone. It has stopped me from trying many things and restricted my life quite a bit. I tend to shrink back when an opportunity is presented to me, meaning I close many doors and am closed off from many people. I avoid both social and professional situations that I think I would have trouble navigating in. If I don’t fully know what an event will be like or if I don’t know everyone attending a small gathering, I usually choose to not attend. It keeps me quite isolated.

If I don’t change this, I believe that I will remain the way that I am for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t want that. It would be repetitive and I would get tired of it eventually. In addition to this, this university is a great place to expand my horizons and it would be a waste if I did not take advantage of this opportunity. There are so many people of various backgrounds and with various personalities at this university. There are certain to be people I get along with–I simply have to put myself out there and be willing to talk to them. To counteract the restrictive tendency to stay within my comfort zone, I simply have to choose experience new things and say yes when the opportunity presents itself. Of course, this is much harder said than done. I believe that I’d also have to learn how to be ok with being uncomfortable and to relax a bit more around people.

Another bad habit of mine is thinking that I have much more time than I actually do. This actually manifests in several ways in my life. For example, if I have 2 hours to get ready, I would probably spend an hour and a half simply on my phone or doing something entirely irrelevant to getting ready. I will do everything else possible–clean my desk, rearrange my clothes, etc. In actuality, I’d only spend 30 minutes getting ready and that time would feel very rushed when it did not need to be that way. I also dislike feeling rushed so that just makes this habit even worse. To fix this, I’ll have to remind myself that 30 minutes is not enough time to get ready at the pace I want. I need to remember that if I have time, I should use it wisely instead of just wasting it away.

A third bad characteristic would be that I overestimate my ability to get up early in the morning. In high school, I would be able to go months just sleeping 4-6 hours a day and waking up at around 7am or 8am every day. I still somewhat believe that, despite proving myself wrong over and over. I am naturally a night owl and I know this. Despite this knowledge, I still sometimes think that I should go to sleep early because I’ll wake up at 8am the next day to do work. I’ve been wrong almost every time I expected this of myself. To remedy this, I definitely need to establish a habit of finishing all my work before bed. I do this a majority of the time but I need to truly eliminate the idea that I can even wake up early and do work for my own benefit.

One of my worst characteristics is sometimes being unreliable. For example I may create plans to hangout with friends, but I tend to cancel at the last minute because I am too lazy to go to them. Another example of this is when I lost the pledge plant. After only a couple of hours, it was stolen in my possession while looking after it. This is a prime example of a bad characteristic because my pledge brothers relied on me to look after it, but my carelessness got the best of me. If I were to cultivate the characteristic of being unreliable my life would be extremely better. Due to the fact that others would be able to trust me more in regards to being at events or just things in general. And being reliable in a workplace is extremely important as many higher ups expect their workers to be at planned events. A second example of a bad characteristic of mine is being a procrastinator. Many times I do tend to wait till the last minute for assignments which is not the best to do in college. If I were to work on not being a procrastinator, my life would be less stressful when tight deadlines come up. And if I were to do better on finishing assignments earlier, it would free up so much time for myself to do whatever I want which I may not have had if I were a procrastinator. Another bad characteristic of mine is not being on top of replying to messages or emails that are important. If I were to work on fixing this bad characteristic of mine I would be able to leave a better impression on people, especially in a workplace. As having communication with others is a very important trait to have and is necessary to establish great relationships with anyone. Communication in general enables an environment where individuals feel safe and confident with one another. A fourth bad characteristic trait of mine is saying yes too often and overworking myself. As someone who strives for improvement, I may take one too many projects at once and induce my own chronic stress. If I were not to do this, I would be able to excel way more on projects I may pick and execute them to my fullest extent. As being able to successfully complete a project to your best ability rather than having it half done is more important. A fifth bad characteristic of mine is sometimes being impulsive. As someone who's down for anything, I tend to make decisions with the tendency of acting without thinking. If I were to fix my impulsiveness I would put myself in better positions which can lead to success rather than failure. As it is super important for every individual to think before they do anything. In conjunction with this idea, it would help me be less regretful of different decisions I have made in the past as a young individual trying to navigate through life.

I believe some of my worst characteristics are my tendency to procrastinate and my poor time management skills. I feel the two characteristics are relatively similar and affect each other. Having poor time management skills and being a chronic procrastinator has caused immense stress. I used to think that there had to be something wrong with me, and that's why I was incapable of being as productive as other students. It was not until I was much older and I was able to speak with mental health professionals that I realized that there are reasons why my work habits are the way they are. I had the opportunity to talk with a clinical psychologist who specializes in mental health disparities amongst underprivileged minority groups and first-generation students. She explained that procrastination is less about laziness but more about our fears attached to our assignments and or tasks. Procrastination is also linked to anxiety. This adds more stress than necessary to academia. But aside from the mental health components linked to my bad traits, being a first-generation underprivileged minority also adds challenges, especially in academic and professional workplaces that most people do not acknowledge.

One's ideal of success looks very different based on your upbringing. This factor negatively affects youth from underprivileged communities because many of us did not grow up in a household with "successful" parents who had the opportunity to seek higher education. So, many of us had to learn independently and were self-motivated to become successful, or we fell into the same patterners our parents were subject to. Even saying that some of us have the opportunity to choose whether we are going to do better than our parents is a stretch because the privilege to excel academically or even pursue higher education is not granted to everyone. There are so many factors that play a role in succeeding, including oppression and systematic racism.

However, for those who do have the opportunity to pursue higher education and or reach levels of success that they did not get to see growing up, like myself, we also experience challenges that can limit us from our highest potential. For instance, a big one is imposter syndrome, which is the constant feeling that you don't belong or are not good enough, which is a familiar feeling amongst a minority, underprivileged, and first-generation individuals. These feelings can result in us questioning or doubting whether we belong, especially in higher education and professional settings. I know this has affected me more than I thought it would. Imposter syndrome has made my experience at UCLA thus far very difficult. Being surrounded by peers who always seem to have their lives together makes it seem like you are the problem, leading to mental health issues and other setbacks.

Somehow turned into a rant, but to sum it up, two of my worst characteristics are procrastinating and time management. After analyzing myself, I have realized that my inability to get things done promptly is more profound than just my laziness. It has a lot to do with my being an oppressed, underprivileged, first-generation individual. I think cultivating these bad habits would make my life a lot more peaceful and organized. I think my anxiety and stress would eat at me less if I could plan out tasks and assignments more efficiently. Suppose I worry less about perfecting assignments and putting them off for as long as possible to avoid stress. And instead, focusing on starting them as soon as possible and receiving help to ensure that they are of good quality will help me sleep more soundly at night. All in all, I think that acknowledging the characteristics that I could improve on is already a step in the right direction. Moving forward, I believe utilizing the resources that I have access to will make my life a lot easier and help me break some of my bad habits.

My worst characteristic is that I am incapable of waking up in a timely and orderly manner. Ever since I could remember, I have always had such a hard time waking up in the morning. There are a multitude of reasons as to why this is, but it is something that has been a large issue in my life. My inability to wake up well has caused me to miss many things and has also taken many hours in which I could be productive away. I think not being able to wake up well has caused a strain of irresponsible decisions on my part. I have missed doctors appointments, as well as the SAT and ACT… It has gotten to the point where I am tempted to buy alarms that literally shake your bed. I always feel worse when I wake up so late or miss things because of how hard it is to wake up. I tend to wake up dreading the day so I often sleep till my body physically can’t anymore. It isn’t unless I am stressing about missing something early that I wake up really early. This has resulted in a terrible schedule for my classes in which I often go to lectures the first week or two before ultimately--never going again. It’s to the point where my roommate group chat oftens sends tiktoks joking about my alarms. I think that if I fixed this a lot of things in my life would be different. I’ve noticed that waking up at an undesirable time often causes me more harm than good. I am often stressed from missing/being late to class and I have to reschedule my day around it. I love planning days out at night, so when the morning does not go as planned. I already feel behind for the rest of the day. There is honestly so much more I could do in a given day if I woke up way earlier than I did. I like to say I’m a night owl, which is true but I also have a terrible attention span. I feel like at night I often have a lot more things that I can get distracted by. However, in the morning there’s rarely anything to get distracted by as everyone is also working. If I fixed this problem, I feel like I could be a whole other Juliana. One of my goals is to learn to wake up well and early enough that I can start my day off by gymming. I like to have classes around noon-time, however, I don’t like to wake up any prior to that than I have to. So this is something I would like to fix because I think waking up early could make me a generally happier person. Getting out of bed is something I often struggle with, especially if I had a rough day the day before. However, I think a lot of it is mental training which is something that I struggle with.

I believe that my worst characteristic is my anger issues, lol. It’s definitely not a side of me that comes out quite that often. I would like to consider myself a pretty chilled back person so honestly it takes a lot for me to truly be upset. But when I’m upset I will admit it gets pretty bad. And I hate that I’m very much aware of it and acknowledge it but it's so hard to take action in the moment because I’m just so upset that I don’t really care about much else. It sounds so bad but I genuinely don’t care about anything that I say, it’s just that in the moment I’m so upset that I don’t care how other people feel, I’ll say anything to get you to leave me alone, even if it means saying something I don’t really believe or mean. I acknowledge that this is a terrible trait, and I truly do want to work on it but it’s so hard when in the moment my feelings just overcome me. I try to recognize in the moment but it’s just difficult (if anyone reading this has any tips let me know hahaha). For now I try to control it by just stepping away from the situation. Because I acknowledge that sometimes I’ll take it as far to hurt someone that I prefer to just step away from the situation, take my time and just cool down on my own. It’s when I’ve calmed down that I realize my wrongs, and that my emotional response is taking over me. Which is why I also feel like I’ll say anything to get someone to leave me alone when I’m that upset, because I understand that I’m soo upset and I just need my own time to calm down on my own and take time to recognize and reflect on my feelings on my own. So in a way it’s been helpful but it also in away encourages me to be a b**ch. I don’t know, honestly I feel like figuring out how to manage your feelings in such an emotional state is always difficult so I try to remind myself that I’m doing my best regardless. I definitely feel like it’s something that I picked up as a child because my dad has terrible anger issues, nothing compared to me, the man gets scary angry. So I feel like as a child growing up around someone who didn't know how to control their anger emotions and was simply all over the place all the time, you slowly start to pick up on these same characteristics. And before you know it, you've developed this trauma response. Because as a child when your parents are this way you almost feel defenseless, so you start to fire back in the same way, because if you don’t stand up for yourself, no one is coming to save you. Haha I don’t know how this got so deep so I truly do hope no one reads these sometimes teehee, but akunnia if you're reading this ily <3.