Capstone Integration


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Nhat Nguyen

Moreau FYE

29 April 2022

Living Out My Mission Statement

My first year as a student at the University of Notre Dame has given me many

opportunities to reflect on who I am as a person and what I value in my life. Week Thirteen of

Moreau helped me to put my values into a concise mission statement:

I want to be a hardworking and disciplined yet compassionate daughter, friend, coworker,

and acquaintance. In my daily life, I am confident and assertive in my actions and

choices. I value my confidence because it took years to develop and helps assert my

presence as an Asian woman who will be working in a white male dominated workforce

after I graduate college. Confidence helps me to be independent and gives me a sense of

pride for what I have accomplished. I seek to be a hard worker as much of my academic

and career satisfaction comes from productivity and completing challenging tasks. I strive

to be disciplined to remain strong in my faith, value, and belief foundations. Remaining

disciplined helps me to accomplish my goals and helps me to make the right decisions.

Having compassion for others aids me in connecting with other people. Compassion

allows me to form strong relationships and friendships that go on a deeper level.

Compassion makes me understand other people’s suffering which in turn, helps me to

recognize the privileges I have in my life and helps me to appreciate the happy moments

in my life. It is easy to forget to have gratitude for small things in life, and I wish to

always show gratitude for my life.



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With today’s fast-paced world, it is easy to forget things we take for granted; it is even

harder to show gratitude for the things that seem to always be present in our lives like a roof over

our heads or food to eat. I, myself, have been guilty of this. For example, I do not realize how

lucky I am for my health until I become sick. To show more gratitude for what I have in life, I

want to take moments each day to center myself and meditate or pray. As Blaise Pascal once

said, “All the unhappiness of men arises from one simple fact: that they cannot sit quietly in their

chamber” (“Why we need to slow down our lives” by Pico Iyer - Moreau FYE Week One). I

believe that training myself to have some quiet time each day will allow me to be more mindful

and intentional with what goes on in my life. Quiet reflection time will help me to focus on and

realize the small things in my daily life that I should be grateful for.

Growing up, my parents have always taught me to be a disciplined person. Looking back,

I believe that my parents teaching me discipline was to help me become a good person who

strives to do the right thing. In my eyes, being disciplined helps me to have a strong foundation

for my core values and beliefs. Once I have a strong foundation, my daily actions will build off

of my foundation, so my actions should, in essence, be good. As I saw and heard in the Hesburgh

film, Father Hesburgh lived out his own advice to “Always do the right thing” (“Hesburgh Film”

by Barca and O’Malley - Moreau FYE Week Two). Throughout the next three years and beyond,

I wish to be firm and disciplined in my work and values just like Father Hesburgh was. Being

firm in my values will help me to not deviate from the right action. Dean G. Marcus Cole notes

another reason why my actions should always be good, right, and just: “  While my education and

position do not grant me immunity from racial violence, they do place me in a position to do

something about it” (“Dean G. Marcus Cole: 'I am George Floyd. Except, I can breathe. And I

can do something.” by Dean G. Marcus Cole - Moreau FYE Week Twelve). My Notre Dame

https://ideas.ted.com/why-we-need-a-secular-sabbath/
https://notredame.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=10159379-7eca-4549-8581-ab9500c9ecd9
https://law.nd.edu/news-events/news/dean-g-marcus-cole-i-am-george-floyd-except-i-can-breathe-and-i-can-do-something/
https://law.nd.edu/news-events/news/dean-g-marcus-cole-i-am-george-floyd-except-i-can-breathe-and-i-can-do-something/


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education places me in a position to know and speak up for the right actions. Constantly doing

the right thing will not only train my discipline but also train my conscience to think without

bias.

A large part of my personality and self is being a hard worker. Whether I am doing

something academically or something for leisure, I want my work to be good. However, as Sister

Aletheia said, “My life is going to end, and I have a limited amount of time” (“Meet the Nun

Who Wants You to Remember You Will Die” by Ruth Graham - Moreau FYE Week Three).

Now, as a college student, I feel like my life is all work, but I do not wish this for the rest of my

life. Life is short, and if I spend the rest of it working, I will eventually get burnt out. I need and

want to incorporate more quiet, interrupted time during the day. One way I can achieve this is

setting aside time for reflection and meditation as I have mentioned before. For a long term

solution, I want to be more aware of my limits and say “no” more often instead of taking on

more work than I can handle.

As an eighteen year old college freshman, I am staring my future in the face. There are so

many possibilities out there in the world for me to explore. However, I feel that I only have three

more years to figure out what I want to do with my life. An idea crafted by Dr. Donald Super has

helped me to learn what I should pay attention to when discerning my career: “The idea is that

the best career choices for a person are those that allow him/her to implement as many part of

his/her self-concept as possible” (“Navigating Your Career Journey” by Undergraduate Career

Services - Moreau FYE Week Four). Dr. Super has shed more light on what I should look for

when discerning my career. My career needs to engage all my talents and parts of myself. I

strongly agree with this view of a person’s career because if I am doing something that utilizes

all parts of myself, I will not get bored or hate what I am doing. Week Five of Moreau asked us

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/memento-mori-nun.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/memento-mori-nun.html
https://undergradcareers.nd.edu/navigating-your-career-journey---moreau/


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to complete a discernment talk with someone who knows us well. After speaking with my dad, I

learned that being disciplined, independent, and organized were traits that showed through in my

personality from an early age. To follow Dr. Super’s idea, I plan to use these traits in my career

discernment.

Part of my definition of a good life involves faith playing a large role in my life.

Although I try my best to remember that I am living God’s will, not my own, I do forget that I

am not living for myself. I often try to control my frustrations and worries by myself even if they

are out of my control. In the future, I want to be more aware of the fact that God is by my side as

I go through life. I can give my worries to Him because He wants to help and sometimes the

worries should not be things I need to worry about. As Dr. Kim said when telling his story, “I

have experienced…many incidents where God will answer my prayers and give me strength” (5

Minutes by Aria Swarr - Moreau FYE Week Six). It is also easy to forget God’s love for me. I

view myself as a straightforward person, so I prefer for things to be directly said or conveyed to

me. However, God does not work in this way. “You can’t convince yourself God loves you, but

you can ask Him to show you” (“Growing up Gay and Catholic” by Jacob Walsh - Moreau FYE

Week 10). God more often works through actions. Actions speak louder than words and last

longer than words. As an only child, I have always wanted companionship aside from my

parents, and God blessed me with three best friends during my first year in college.

At the end of my life, I want to be known as a compassionate person. I believe that

compassion is the common emotion that links every human being. We all crave human

interaction and compassion helps to cultivate that interaction and conversation. A quote from

Tattoos on the Heart by Father Greg Boyle clearly illustrates how to become compassionate:

“Close both eyes; see with the other one” (Tattoos on the Heart by Father Greg Boyle - Moreau

https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/transform/why-does-god-allow-suffering/?utm_source=moreau&utm_medium=class&utm_campaign=spring_2022
https://grottonetwork.com/make-an-impact/transform/why-does-god-allow-suffering/?utm_source=moreau&utm_medium=class&utm_campaign=spring_2022
https://grottonetwork.com/keep-the-faith/community/reflective-narrative-about-being-gay-and-catholic/?utm_source=moreau&utm_medium=class&utm_campaign=spring_2022
https://canvas.nd.edu/courses/39639/files/523844?module_item_id=167972


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FYE Week Seven). To be compassionate means to care and understand another person regardless

of background or status in life. When connecting with others, I want to be compassionate and see

with the other eye. Connecting with other people also requires being open to new ideas and

perspectives. For example, with politics, I need to ensure that I do not end up in an echo

chamber. As said by Eitan Hersh, “It seems to me that the way that people are doing politics is

much more similar to a hobby than to what I think of with politics, which is, you know, acquiring

power” (“Passion Isn't Enough” by Hidden Brain Media - Moreau FYE Week Eleven). For

anything that I try to understand, I want to understand the topic in its entirety. I do not want the

topic to get twisted like how politics can be viewed as a hobby instead of something that impacts

our daily lives.

Finally, in my life, I want to be a good daughter. I can do this by accompanying my

parents, especially my mom. As Professor Steve Reifenberg said, “Look beyond your immediate

concerns; show compassion and accompany one another” (“Teaching Accompaniment” by

Professor Steve Reifenberg - Moreau Week Nine). I highly believe in the value of accompanying

people on their journeys. Accompaniment does not mean altering the course of someone’s life

but being present as a person whom another person can rely on. To help my mom in her journey,

I want to be someone she can speak her feelings to and someone she knows is supporting her.

Utilizing everything I have learned in the Moreau First Year Experience, I hope to live

my remaining three college years as a grounded individual. With everything I do, I want my

work and actions to be good and a reflection of myself. When I go out into the job force and the

real world, I wish to carry all the values and lessons I have learned from Notre Dame.

https://hiddenbrain.org/podcast/passion-isnt-enough/
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hZbSdVImfn2hZDqMrdL96dZCNOtHuf6C-lg3sH-Rs30/edit


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