Thanksgiving

In my life there are a lot of things that I am thankful for and here are just a few. First of all, I am very thankful for my friends and family for everything they do for me and how they are always there for me. I am also thankful for everyone I have met because in one way or another, whether it be bad or good, they have changed my life. Teachers are also people I am thankful for, yes this includes you Mr. Fritz, because they teach me and are trying to prepare me for the real world. I may not always show that I am thankful for everyone I mentioned in this and many more but I am truly blessed and very thankful for all of you.

How do you want people to remember you after you are gone? That is a strange thing to think about because you don't know when you will have your last breath and it is just strange to think about dying. I know that when I am gone I want people to say, "Oh, yeah I know Tanner Erwin, he was a great guy who would do anything for his friends or family." That is why it is important to act how you want people to remember you no matter what because only God knows when you will take your last breath. So think about it sometime, how will people remember me when I am no longer on God's green Earth?

Self-Improvement

These last couple weeks we have got into groups based on what we think needs the most change in our school. I chose attitude towards self-improvement in the offseason towards athletics and improving in the classroom. My group thinks this is important because we know how much it hurts to lose in a big game and how important a good education is for your future. If you don't try in class then you won't have good grades which is something colleges look at and if you don't improve yourself during the offseason you aren't only hurting yourself but your whole team. Yeah nowadays you don't neccessarily need a college degree to get a good job with all the varieties out there but having that college degree won't hurt you. You want to be a person that your teammates can look to when they need help and if you don't participate in offseason activities it will be hard for someone to take you seriously. Your attitude towards your school work and any extracurricular activities you are in is how people will view you and that is why they are important.

Aaron Thomas

Last week Aaron Thomas, the son of Ed Thomas, came and spoke to our school about knowing where you came from. He said that whenever he hears about Williamsburg he only hears good things and that we are a community with a lot of pride in our town, athletics, and our schools in general. He then asked us who thought they would live in Williamsburg their whole life and virtually no one put their hand up, then he asked who thought they would stay in Iowa this brought a few hands into the air, including mine, and then he asked who will move to a big city like New York or L.A. and this brought up the rest of the hands in the gym. He said no matter where we end up going we should make it a goal for us to take some of Williamsburg with us. This is all about remember where you are from no matter what and improving the other places we visit with that part of our community. This really made me think about how much this community means to me and how grateful I am to live in such a great place. So if I live in Williamsburg, somewhere else in Iowa, or move out of the state I am going to make it a goal of mine to take a piece of Williamsburg with me.

Vuk Vukovic

One of the foreign exchange students, who I have beat in pickle ball numerous times, did a presentation over his home country of Montenegro for our class the other day. He talked about how much different the lifestyle is over there compared to the lifestyle in the United States, he said that they pretty much everywhere and they don't have fast food. This is one of the problems the United States has in our population and how healthy we are. If we take a stand to become more healthy like other foreign countries we wouldn't be thought of as a obese society by other countries and it would just benefit everyone. Our government has been trying to address this problem but people don't buy into it so it is somewhat useless. We as the young people of our society need to work harder to make our country healthy.

Working Together

In order for a group of people to be able to work with each other, everyone involved must have their own role. If you are going to be effective, everyone must be involved in one way or another and then have one person to be a leader that will be able to start the group work. You have to stay open-minded so you can take in each other's opinions. If you don't stay open-minded then you won't listen to other people's ideas and what if that person has an idea that would perfect the project. If you are working in groups watch and see if everyone is involved and has their own job to contribute to the group.

Changing Your Life

People will sometimes say I am a changed person and then go and do that same thing whether they realize they are doing it or not. That person is obviously not changed. It takes 21 days to drop an old habit and 21 days to start a new habit. This may seem like a long time to get rid of a small thing that you do but it could be small to you but huge to someone else. All you have to do in order to be able to change is to know why you want to change and how you are going to do it. Sometimes it takes you hitting the very bottom in life to realize that you need to make that change. This alone should be one driving force to lose that habit. So when you think that you have no hope and want to run to someone to save you just think about how this can be positive in your life.