The Challenges of a Leader

Challenge #2 The Fire Pit

Today at the Ropes Course I learned so much about myself as a leader. For me it is very difficult to try to communicate with other people without speaking, and learning how to do that was a great challenge for me. Not being able to speak made me realize that sometimes it is better to say anything at all then to say many things. At first it was very difficult for me to get my ideas through, and especially when all the girls were talking at once, but once I did I felt very proud of myself.

Another thing that I learned today was to trust the people who are around me. I learned to trust that my teammates would be there for me if I fell down. They would be right there ready to catch me and not let me hit the ground. Although, this challenge may seem very simple, for me it was very frightful, because I wasn't very sure of the people around me. I wasn't so sure that they would actually catch me if I ever did come close to falling. I am glad that I learned to trust my teammates because I feel like it brings me closer to them.

Building Trust!

Dealing with the challenges that were being given to me were really challenging to me both physically and mentally. A physical challenge that I dealt with today was trying to go through a small whole from a spider web activity. I had to go through without touching the strings! What made it difficult for me was the fact that I was muted and couldn't let my teammates know that that instead of them trying to help me get through they were actually hurting me. I tried waving my hands and shacking my head whenever they tried to lift my leg, but they just wouldn't understand. It wasn't until the instructors gave me permission to speak that I told them to let go of my leg and help me get my head and arms through the hole first.

Feeling Accomplished

A mental challenge that I faced was dealing with the group of girls that I was grouped with. They aren't terrible girls, if that is what you are thinking, but the total opposite. They are all such great leaders, but because they are such great leaders each of them tried to get everyone to perform each of their strategies. Instead of this being a solution to the difficult task we were asked to perform, it created great chaos among ourselves. It even got to a point where I had to shout, and tell everyone to speak one at a time. I felt really proud of what I did because everyone actually listened to me and we were all able to accomplish our task.

Working As a Team :)

I really enjoyed learning so much about myself and observing how we all interacted with each other as a team during our challenges. It was such a nice thing to reflect upon all our mistakes and accomplishments as we finished one challenge at a time. Something that I really loved about my group was that we all learned from our mistakes and did everything we could in order for us not to repeat them. As we past one challenge at a time we came to figure out that they began to feel easier and easier because we all learned to work together as a team.