Peruvian Culture

 Millennials,

            Believe it or not but I am Peruvian! My grandma was born and raised in Lima Peru, and she soon got a student visa to come to the United States for college. While she was here she met and fell in love with my grandpa. They have three daughters who are all half Peruvian. Which would my sisters and I a fourth Peruvian. People always seem to be shocked when I point out that I am Peruvian because I have more of the Swedish features from my father. Now, in our Peruvian family three things are very important to us family, food, and hard work.

            When it comes to cooking in our family it is amazing! My grandma has made it her mission to make sure that we all know how to make cilantro, Seco, and arroz y pollo. She has passed down what she knows about cooking to my mom, and my mom has shown me. I plan to keep the Peruvian dishes alive when I have my own family as well. One thing that I have noticed when we do family gatherings we tend to make so much food that we have left overs for days. It is pretty funny because my grandma and mom will get mad if people don’t eat the food that they make. They both work hard on what they make and most of the meals that are Peruvian dishes take about two hours of prep to make. In the end the food that they serve is always good.

            The next thing I have noticed is that there are a lot of members in my family. I don’t necessarily know if we are a big family because we are Peruvian, but I love it. I never get bored because I always have someone to talk to or play with. My family all live relativity close to one another, so we are always there to support each other. With how close we all are together holidays can sometimes get crazy. My favorite holiday to celebrate with my family is new year’s because we get to do all of our Peruvian traditions. Some of the things we for new year’s include eating 12 grapes (for the twelve months), running down the block with an empty suitcase (to get rid of all our “luggage” from the past year), and lastly pouring a cup of water over our shoulder (to clean yourself).  To me it is weird that other families don’t do these traditions, but I understand that all families have their own traditions that they do.  I am thankful for my big Peruvian family and all the joy they bring me.

            Peruvians have hard work in their blood. My family has shown me what can happen if I try my best in everything I do. Not only has my family shown me what hard work is, but they have also taught me it. My family is all about everyone putting in their own share. We work together to help those around us struggling feel loved. The biggest example I have of this is all the men in our families. They all work hard to provide for their children and woman. Though none of the men in our families are Peruvian decent my grandma has talked to them about what a man needs to his wife. Because of this all three of my grandmother’s daughters have been able to find a loving hardworking husband. Because my grandmother has used her Peruvian cultural to influence our family it has made us all more loving and caring of each other.

            I can say that I love my Peruvian family so much. Without them I don’t think I would know what good food is, what hard work looks like, and I wouldn’t know what a big loving family is like. I am grateful that my grandmother has kept her Peruvian cultural and traditions alive through us. I can’t wait to have a family of my own so I can keep spreading the traditions.

           

Blogger,

Laken Nordin

Family Systems and Corrective Feedback

Millennials,

Families are what make us familiar with the concepts and ideas that we have today. There  also happens to be four different types of theories that can be used to explain family phenomena’s, and they are exchange theory, symbolic interaction theory, conflict theory, and family systems theory. Today in my blog I will be focusing on the family system theory. This theory helps identify the roles that each person has within the family, and how they contribute.

With my own family, the roles are spread out between the member of my family. My fathers’ role for our family is the provider; he works ten hours day in- order to make all three girls in his life happy.  My mother is stay at hope mom, but that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have a role or contribute to our family. In fact, my sisters and I often see her as the discipliner. Though some people would see this as a bad thing I don’t, I know that my mom is just trying to make me a more mature young adult. My sisters and I also have roles, but smaller ones in compression to my parents. Carrington, my younger sister her role comes off as the one who doesn’t let anyone bother her. She is often the one that we turn to when we need some kind of “protection” from someone. Kylie on the hand, she is my married sister, and she is the brains of the three of us. We always ask her questions about English and writing because she is so good at it. And me, I am usually the funny goof ball who  tries to bring peace when there is a conflict. This is my family system, and it may be different from yours, but that’s okay not everyone is going to be the same.

When it comes to discipline my mom like to give us feedback is the most loving way possible. She will sit my sister and I down and give us a what I like to call a “life talk.”  These "life talks" are kind of like corrective feedback. Corrective feedback is when behavior is bad or not acceptable. The “life talks” consist of negative feedback that my mom has noticed we were doing. My mom like to do a question answer type form of her famous “life talk.” It begins with her asking us why we made the bad decision that we did.  Then she listens to what we say, and she tells us what we could have done instead. Her favorite line to use with us is “Why lie if you know that the punishment is only going to be worse than if you would have just told the truth?” I like this because it is a positive way to discipline us. My sisters and I get to know why my mother doesn’t like certain things, but this also allows the four of us to grow closer together. Though we get negative feedback from my mother it influences us in a positive way to where we change our behavior.

I hope that today’s blog has helped you understand that family systems theory, and that you can identify each of the roles in your family. I would like to remind you that each family system is unique and different from each other. Some family systems even have sub systems; which is pretty much a system within a system. Those subsystems can be identified as parental or marital subsystem. With my personal experience with corrective feedback form my mother, I hope this has opened your eyes on how negative feedback can be good for you. If all we got was positive feedback we would never grow or progress. Negative feedback allows us to have a behavior change, and makes you stop doing what you were before.  Lastly, I would like to close with a quote By President Spencer W. Kimball, he says “Each of us has more opportunities to do good and to be good than we ever use. These opportunities lie all around us. Whatever the size of our present circle of effective influence, if we were to improve our performance even a little bit, that circle would be enlarged. There are many individuals waiting to be touched and loved if we care enough to improve in our performance.”

Blogger,

Laken Nordin

        

Fertility Decline

Millennials,

 In 1969, back when most of our parents were young, there was a man named Bob Erlick who published a book called “Population Bomb.” This book talked about how there are too many people on the earth. At the time, this was written there was only 3.61 billion people on the earth. To solve this problem of over populating he suggested to not have children. With this idea of there’re being to many people inhabiting the earth, the fertility rate has since declined.

(from surveys is was discovered that fertility rate has increased because it was expensive to have children)Fertility decline has happened because those surveyed said that it is expensive, with less children more opportunities appear for the one existing child, and because they grew up in small families  it makes it traditional for them. Some of the existing issues that come along with the fertility decline include: young adults are becoming more independent leading them to have children later in life, when you have children later in life you don’t get to experience things the same way that you would have starting our earlier, there are many false prophets on the earth today trying to persuade young people not to have children.

            In today’s world, there are 7.2 billion people on the earth. If we were to give each person exactly one acre of land everyone could fit into the state of Texas. Population is based on how many people total live on the earth. Birthrate is based on everyone thousand births. Fertility rate is based on the number of children you have in a lifetime divided by the number of woman who can still have babies. With these in mind, people in today’s world are starting to live longer due to an increase in medicine, technology, and jobs.  I believe that it is our job as young adults to change this fertility decline.

In The Family Proclamation to the World we are told that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of his children. If we are not having children this could affect the human capital. Human capital is how each individual contributes. With how much fertility has decreased we can only picture how this will affect our own personal lives.  Since I am a Mormon it is common to get married at a young age, however, most of my friends are non-members. I have seen the age different in my own parents compared to theirs. My parents (both age 45) are often involved with my life and can do many athletic activities with me. Compared to my friend’s parents who are in their late fifties to sixties are often left watching instead of participating. I know that when my parents begin to become older that I will be able to start providing for them and still be financially stable. With the age gap of my friends to their parents I feel that they would need more time to be able to provide for their elder parents.

            There are many false prophets in the world today as well trying to persuade the young minds of us millennials. In Deuteronomy 18:20 we read “But the prophet, which shall ^presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.”  This means that those who are trying to give the message of having children later in life or not to have any a positive view are wrong. Once women reach the age of thirty producing children becomes increasingly difficult, so with that being said why wait? With having the blessing of creating families we must also remember that we get to take part in making that body for the child, but heavenly father has already made the spirit. I would like to close my blog with one last quote by Thomas S. Monson “Children then and children now bless our lives, kindle our love, and prompt our good deeds.” I hope that this blog has opened your eyes on why fertility has declined, and why it needs to be changed.

Blogger,

Laken Nordin