Fancy Butter

Saturday, February 25th, 2017

Yes... fancy butter. But I will get into that...

Today was a good day overall, the opening keynote speaker was very moving. Jeremy Poincenot from CampusSpeak presented "When Fraternity Really Matters" and told the audience the story of how he became legally blind at the age of 19. He was diagnosed with a genetic condition called LHON that caused his direct sight to fade and blur. He can now only see out of his peripheral vision. In his take, one of the main takeaways was that each one of us has the power to change someone's life. We should always be kind, for everyone we meet is fighting a hard battle. We must focus on the good, be happy where we are with what we have, and enjoy the present. This all really hit home for me. It was almost like a kick in the ass for me. I thought about it a lot today and reflected on myself for most of it. I felt as though these words were intended for me to hear. I really needed it personally and it has thus far boosted my mood and entire day. It's time for a change of mindset.

Continuing on into the first institute of the day, I attended the "Wellbeing: Taking Time to Take Care of You" session facilitated by Sydney Vandeveer and Megan Foster. This session was the most amazing session of the entire day in my opinion. I felt like it helped me plot out my future, get some helpful hints on how to prioritize my life and my goals, as well as teach me a few things about my work ethic and how to take care of myself personally.

After this, I attended "Cut the SH!T - Peer Accountability" by Ashley Rastetter and the session was informative for me from listening to other members in the room. I thought the presentation was poorly composed and executed, in my opinion. Though the session had great intent, the crowd gathering clearly showed the importance of this topic, the session needed to be altered in order to encompass the topic and its many independent areas. The session was mostly telling us to set guidelines and check-in personally with members. I only thought this was ineffective because it was likely that most of the people attending this session had already tried this (I know I have).

After this was lunch~~~~ THE BEST TIME OF THE DAY. EXCEPT THEY RUINED IT WITH VEGETABLES. :( I just wanted more sandwiches... we all can't win and that's okay, I'll deal.

Next session was "Why We Need To Talk With Our Members About Race". This session was very informative and extremely uncomfortable at times for many of the members in the audience. The discussion was productive in areas and counterintuitive in others. It was noticeable the discomfort of many people and it was called out at one point. I felt fine in my opinion, but I could understand the situation from both perspectives. The topic pushed the idea of anti-racism instead of non-racism being a persons "go-to" default. If everyone had the conversations and took anti-racist actions, the world would get progressively better in terms of racial divides.

The last session I attended at NGLA was, "IMPROV YOUR CHAPTER" and this session was absolutely amazing. James Robilotta was such a funny and influential speaker as well as comedian. He led the discussion in such a way that you almost forgot this was about greek life and the greek community until he wrapped it all together after each point. The session was funny, engaging and overall a great time. He really made the experience at NGLA for me with his comedic commentary throughout.

At the end of the night, we had the Awards Banquet. This was a great meal and award ceremony and Maribeth Flakes took home the Phillipi Award for being the Best Advisor in the World. She's a super hero to the BSU community and I will forever be thankful for her support and work. The dinner was delicious. There was little butter slices on the table that had the conference centers logo engraved into it. It was very strange yet oddly satisfying. I hated destroying it, but I ate a lot of bread so it was absolutely necessary to do so.

This last day of NGLA was great. I enjoyed my time here so much and I hope to someday contribute more to the organization and event in whatever way I can.