iExamen 2

Elizabeth Milonas

Dr. Ellis

Understanding Literature 101.16

22 October 2013

“Kind, Useful, and True”

            Each day I strive to be a better person. With this mentality, I propose to be kind continuously, up-beat and look toward a positive outcome for all circumstances. Therefore when handed this assignment, I immediately thought it would be simple, quick and effortless.

I woke up on Sunday, October 20^th with the iExamen 2-assignment paper next to my bed as a reminder complete the task of saying, “only what is kind, useful, and true” for the entire day. Soon enough, my mom called me on the phone (as is customary everyday). She began to tell me her plans for the day in addition to all of my immediate and extended family’s “news.” While I listened to her stories, I noticed that I wanted to tell her that it did not concern me on what Thea Vasso is buying for Angelo’s 6^th birthday (which actually is over a month away). What I wanted to say was: “I do not care,” but that could be taken in a negative connotation; it would be flat out rude. Yet it was the truth, from my perspective. I smiled to myself because I soon realized that one sentence could be interpreted differently from various angles. I ended up showing interest in the conversation, rather than speaking my mind because it was easier than causing fuss over something so simple. It was better this way to be kind as apposed to truthful.

Later on in the day, my roommates had soon returned, one by one, from their various fall break excursions. One of my roommates began to show us the different outfits she had purchased while she had gone home for the weekend. It is customary for our suite to model off our new purchases; therefore she began to try on the clothing. As she modeled one of the shirts she bought, she asked us what we thought of it. Say only what is kind, useful, and true flashed in the back of my mind. In other occasions I would refer to the “honesty policy” and tell her that the shirt didn’t suit her, if I felt that was the case. That statement would be true and useful, as interpreted by me. Yet in her view it would be mean and disappointing all together. Therefore I decided to try to combine usefulness, truth and kindness by suggesting the addition of accessories and explain the ways it flattered her (instead of directing the flaws). By incorporating positive suggestions, it benefitted the situation because we managed to create useful suggestions that were kind and truthful.

Communicating in the objective of using comments which were altogether kind, useful and true was much more tricky than expected. It was interesting to note that my thoughts weren’t as nice as I had assumed! Furthermore it was important to analyze interpretations because it seems comments can be viewed differently from each point of view. Overall it is difficult to state something with the clarification of it being kind, useful and true at the same time from every outlook.