Psychology Project

The project I chose was to read the Bible every day or at least read the Gospel for that day and write down my reflections regarding what I've read based on the readings or through the reflection questions that come along with it. One of the main reasons why I chose this topic is because I wanted to learn more and reflect more on my faith and I know that there's no simpler way to do it than to read the book made by God himself. My first project was supposed to be praying the rosary everyday, but then I wanted to learn even more, deepen my relationship, and have learnings that I can carry out with me everyday, which is why I switched my project form praying the rosary to reading he Bible.

Although, I was very driven to do so, the results were sadly unsatisfactory.

The goal of this mini-research, as stated above, was for me to learn more and reflect more on my faith. I started this research right after the submission of the preliminary paper. Which gives me a time frame of roughly a month and a half. For me to be able to track my progress, I wrote down my reflections on a notebook along with the date and the Gospel of the day, it was my way of both tracking down my progress and learning and immersing myself more into the readings and learning more about my faith and myself. I also excluded Sunday Gospels in my reflections because I thought I didn't need to since the priest will be in charge of telling us about the Gospel that day. 

For the results, I transferred the reflections I wrote on my journal onto this blog for easy viewing and so that it is easier to see the dates and the Gospels I have reflected on.

Click HERE to see my entries.

Based from the results it can be easily said that I have failed in completing this Mini-Research of mine. For the first week I was committed but then I saw that I was gradually lessening my reflections entries until I was only left with 1 reflection per week. 

The mini-research wasn't successful, one of the main reasons would be because I didn't have a very strong motivation to commit myself to this project. I told myself that if I missed out on one day I will buy my little bother anything he wants, but based from the results, I think that punishment wasn't strong enough for me to stay focused. Another reason was because of lack of time and attention because of school. It can be seen that when it was nearing October I was only writing 1 time a week, and when it was already October, I wasn't able to place any journal entries at all. 

The psychological concept I can link to this paper is motivation. The punishment I gave myself wasn't enough to motivate me to do my job. Although it did provide me with a great intrinsic outcomes, maybe it was because I did not have any external incentive that made me want to do what I had to do. I think it would have been better if I can eat a piece of chocolate, or watch an episode of my favourite show or other things after I did my reflection, then maybe the results would have been better. 

Even if it wasn't successful, the lessons I learned, and the inspiration I got from doing this paper was great. Reflecting on the Gospels really made me think more about how I lived my life and how lacking I am in doing my part as a Catholic. Even if I only got to reflect on a lesser number than expected, I got to learn more and appreciate more how important it is to read the scriptures. Before, I used to not like the act of reading the bible because it was boring for me, but now I can see why the faith encourages all Catholics to read it because it is a manual for life. It was regretful how I wasn't able to carry out the research to its fullest extent because of my self-known character and lack of motivation (as stated above). 

For the future students who will do a mini-research, I strongly recommend that you do a research that is simple and attainable, but will benefit you a lot. Go for goals that you can attain so that you don't have to stress yourself over it too much. Another is if you're going for a new skill, make sure that you are fully interested in learning that skill. Make sure that you have strong motivators or incentives and punishments so that you can carry out your research more efficiently. The last recommendation is that  you ask for the participation of the people around you so if in case you forget, people are there to remind you. 

REFLECTION QUESTIONS: Are you conscious of God’s protection and love? Do you thank God and your guardian angel for so much care?

Yes, yes I am. I feel God's love the most when I'm down at my worst, when I feel like there's nothing else I can do, I always turn to Him. I never asked why such things are happening to me but I always just say that whatever happened it was all according to His will. I will never urn out of thanks to God. No matter how happy or how sad I am, I have nothing but thanks and love for God and my angels.