Methodology
Regaining equilibrium
The whole experience established a clearer path when it comes to my first impulses and preferences. Using reflective research as my method was not a surprise for me. The effectiveness of my research led me to narrow my area of interest. Analysing the posts in a sequential order can show an insignificant difference in the approached style. I truly enjoy reflecting on any of my actions or general subjects, to discover my way of thinking and shaping my future reactions.
Constantly dreaming, wondering and questioning my inner-self are traits established in my personality. Reflection is the main step into gaining full awareness and it triggers the possibility of finding the desired answers (Knapp, Gottlieb & Handelsman, 2017).
The posts are based on personal experiences and are approaching either chapters from my past or ideas that at some point caught my attention. Thinking about my feelings, choices and ways of creating artworks helped me selecting intriguing ideas to debate, research and reflect on, following my instinct.
Complete objectivity was never an existing aspect for me. Philosophically speaking, under any circumstances, there will always be a form of subjectivity involved trough a functional human mind exposing its point of view. After researching about the subject, my view expanded in general terms comprehending the fact that objectivity represents the highest form of respect for the approached subject and it creates its surroundings when no other form of emotion is present (Ratner, 2002).
My approach tends to be subjective on a certain level, despite always trying to show objectivity as much as I can when it comes to reflective topics. Having an overall view on a specific subject, along with analysing different perspectives and scenes helps with fully understanding an issue. There are chances to makes it even more complex, depending on the scenario. I tend to put in balance facts and common knowledge, without involving any political, religious, or moral idioms. Thinking about a possible wider approach can be spotted in each open conclusion of the posts.
My actions are mostly based on feelings, this being one of my characteristic traits since I was young. One of my guilty pleasures is just to understand the deeper reason for feeling or acting in a visible way. Many topics were chosen by introspection and my need to understand people’s point of view to create my own opinion. One of my objectives was to make the reader feel exactly what I felt while writing every word. To grow along with me and leave with new information in mind or raising eyebrows. Some of the posts are exploring taboo subjects or daily struggles every artist has, without being aware of them, making the whole atmosphere of the blog as being a non-judgmental place.
Feelings are playing an enormous role in my writing style. Depending on the surroundings, emotions or my overall mood, tiny changed details can be observed in how I tend to speak about the presented issue. Besides, my soft skills would never let me down when exposing my beliefs to an unknown public and make me overthink and twist the problem on every side.
On a few posts, I have tried to replicate the research discussed there in a particular way. Based on my experience, I analysed my inner-self, regarding the approach subject. Trying to visualise myself dealing with a specific problem, for a better understanding, I tried to be a part of the practical side of the topic. I tackle some of the discussed statements by making myself the guinea pig and develop my” live” reaction, placing it as the starting point of the whole scene.
My current choices are influenced by past positive and negative experiences on a large scale, as I have mentioned in the “Self-love-time-machine” post. Defining my way of seeing things I can say not much had changed in comparison with a younger version of myself, but the only observable difference is that now I know my priorities, I am more secure in taking actions and I am not afraid of being wrong, always choosing to assume everything I say and receive constructive feedback when needed. Also, my sense of preferring the most unconventional topics to face things people are afraid of remained one of my priority values.
Because I love writing and engaging people into being introspective, I consider my posts to have a high percentage of originality. All the presented statements are original even if in that the inspiration came from revised articles or books. I always had believed that before making an idea public you need to filter your thoughts through many layers of your imagination and realistic perspectives. Treat everything with a pinch of salt despite the awards a published source has.
Reliability and validity were present during the whole process, representing key factors into gaining trust-worthiness from other people. I mainly analysed in-depth each unanswered question I had so far. Using peer-review materials, rather than unverified articles in most of the cases provides a relief sensation at some stage of the reading process. Although I prefer reading online blogs and magazine articles more, verified sources showing case studies, experiments and measured researches are always a safe way to build an indestructible opinion on.
Nevertheless, on some of the posts, I started contemplating about multiple complementary situations. At some point, the initial idea is not even related to the one I started the post with, due to the presence of curiosity, increasing the importance of the question, step by step. I do not consider that I have gone too in-depth with any of my exposed ideas and as a perfectionist, I could have found many more solutions or solving alternatives to many queries I have had, which I did not do. Repeating this task over time would lead to a performance in my analytical skills and in a better understanding of the concept of objectivity and subjectivity (Inayah et al., 2017).
Moreover, I had limitations when speaking about many aspects and as much as I desired to embrace the efficiency of my critical skills I am afraid I will not be able to, at the moment. Due to the lack of orientation or the presence of never-ending fields of research, when I got stuck between words I used the “So what?" question and like an annoying toddler, I was suddenly surrounded by plenty of unexplored territories.
To conclude, the importance of owning an informed-based opinion rather than making hypotheses and speculations on rumours is more powerful now than ever. This journey helped me to develop my hard and soft skills, on multiple plans, along with bringing back my passion for writing any thoughts I am concerned about.
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Inayah, A.T., Anwer, L.A., Shareef, M.A., Nurhussen, A., Alkabbani, H.M., Alzahrani, A.A., Obad, A.S., Zafar, M. and Afsar, N.A. (2017) "Objectivity in subjectivity: do students’ self and peer assessments correlate with examiners’ subjective and objective assessment in clinical skills? A prospective study", BMJ open, (Online) vol. 7, no. 5, pp. e012289-e012289. Available from: http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/10.1136/bmjopen-2016-012289 [Accessed: 5th January 2021]
Knapp, S., Gottlieb, M.C. and Handelsman, M.M. (2017) "Enhancing Professionalism Through Self-Reflection", Professional psychology, research and practice (Online) vol. 48, no. 3, pp. 167-174. Available from: http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/10.1037/pro0000135 [Accessed: 29th December 2020]
Ratner, C., (2002) September. Subjectivity and objectivity in qualitative methodology. In Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung/Forum: Qualitative Social Research (Online) vol. 3, no. 3. Available from: https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-3.3.829 [Accessed: 5th January 2021]
















