I’ve never really put much thought into my own strengths, skills and my role in a team, at least this was the case until Loon Lake. Recently we went on a trip to Loon Lake where we told to think of our strengths, our influence on other people, our skills and what we need for the future and this triggered me to reflect on who I wanted to be in the future and who I am in the present (my skills and strengths). The guides in this trip did this through different activities which invoked trust and teamwork and others that invoked thought and reflection, these being the ones that made me re-evaluate where my life was going and where I wanted to be in the future.
The trip to Loon Lake was a relatively short one but it felt even shorter as I had a great time during the ride with my peers but the moment we got there I was rather bored (this wasn’t the case for much longer though). All we did in the first couple of hours was some icebreakers which dissapointed me as I was expecting much more from the trip. After doing the icebreakers we we’re guided to a place called the panabo where my views of the trip and of life in general changed greatly. We we’re separated into a couple of groups and were told to reflect about strengths by taking a small quiz. I responded truthfully and turns out I’m a challenger which means I tend to challenge myself and others which is honestly extremely accurate as I always try to improve myself be it fitness or on an academic level. This also encouraged me to try even harder in everything else during this trip and in accomplishing my goals in life. After this we ate dinner and went straight to bed.
The next day we woke up, quickly ate breakfast and were informed of our next activity which happened to be a rock climbing wall. This wasn’t too complicated of an activity but I chose the hardest difficulty as I was inspired by the quiz I had taken the previous day even though when I started I wanted to take the easy route. Even though I didn’t make it to the top I felt far more accomplished than if I would’ve done the easiest difficulty as I tried my best and did better than I ever thought I could, this same sentiment followed me throughout the trip and inspired me to try out many new things. After this we did low ropes which was an activity were we were encouraged to work as a team to finish different courses, this wasn’t as impactful as the previous activity but it was a whole lot of fun and it brought me much closer to the group. We ended the day by eating a great meal and going to bed.
On day three we didn’t do too much but I still had a great day. We started off the day with archery which I did great in even though it was my first time, this also helped me challenge myself as I tried out something new, I also had a great time competing and talking to my friends. The rest of the day wasn’t too memorable at least it would’ve been if we hadn’t done the trust falls. This simply consisted of falling and the people in your group catching you but it was great as I got closer to my group and built trust with them (which we built on later).
The next couple of days we’re some of the best in the whole trip as we had some of the most fun activities yet, these included high ropes which consisted of being held by a harness and walking trough a course which was extremely thrilling and encouraged me to face me fear of heights, the scavenger hunt, which had us looking for different answers along the campus, this was great as it was challenging, was fun and it once again brought me closer to my group. We didn’t only have fun and challenging activities though we also had reflective activities one of which being a even bigger trust fall. We were told to stand on a chair on top of a table and fall back to be catched by our peers. This made me trust my peers much more as not once we failed the person falling back even though some teachers tried it out. We also had some more activities related to reflection the biggest of which being one where we were told to sit down at one side of the gym and told some statements like if we were not born in canada, if they applied to us we had to walk to the other side of the gym, this started off with some simple questions but slowly escalated to some very personal questions which even brought many to tears, this made me feel much more empathetic towards my peers and brought me closer than ever before as the previous activities had been building up to this.
On the last day we had an exhibition for our parents here, we showed them posters we had made relating to our strengths and things that were important to us, we also had to make a presentation about the most important things we learned in the trip (leadership, emotional intelligence, etc.) But the biggest thing of all was the final talk we had as we got into a big circle and each student said what their individual goal for the future was, I personally said that I would use a strategy we learned we should use during an argument, which is that we should feel, think and then compromise. I chose this as I believe it will help me the most out of everything I learnt as I will use this everywhere, be it in school, work, or even in my home life and it will help me develop a better relationship with people.
