MY MAJOR WORK JOURNEY

THERE IS NO OBVIOUS ANSWER WAITING TO BE DISCOVERED, IT IS OFTEN THE JOURNEY WHICH WILL TEACH US MORE!!!
My Year 12 Experience at Lorien Novalis was very challenging, rewarding and eventually really satisfying. As an individual in a class situation, it was great to see our class finally join together and help each other accomplish 10 brilliant Major Works by the end of the year. We supported and guided each other, sometimes unknowingly but most often with clear intention, we gave each other ideas, advice and practical help that was extremely valuable in creating each and every amazing project. It was a journey that we all embarked on with very little knowledge of what lay ahead, we journeyed into the unknown with strength and courage. The creative impulses and ideals that had always been instilled in us throughout our education came alive in that final year. Although the year brought with it many near breakdowns when something didn’t go according to plan, it was certainly an incredible journey with many joyful moments! I was very grateful to have this amazing opportunity to express my thoughts in an artistic way, and I gained a vast amount from this experience. We were a dynamic group, and we encountered many emotional roller coasters along the way, however we all had loads fun and learnt a great deal from each other, from our wonderful teachers and also from ourselves! We were given amazing freedom with the paths we could take for our Major Works. It was our choice.....any subject, any medium, make the work your own, make it unique, and make it wonderfully impressive! The sky was really our only limit, and some of us even challenged that!

We knew that having been given this freedom, our teacher’s had placed incredible trust with us, we were left to explore the different ways we could achieve our dreams and desires. Over the years, the school had provided us with the knowledge, self-confidence and the ability to create something brilliant from our own impulse and initiative. We were not handed a guide-book on a silver platter, although sometimes that would have been really helpful! The Major Work journey is all about discovering your personal capabilities and what you can achieve from your own ideas and initiative! We were let loose to explore our imagination, our creativity, our experiences and our place among the class, the school and the world, I feel like I learnt a lot about myself. While travelling this journey with my class, I discovered my journey!

I expressed this in a poem that I performed through Eurythmy, which is a form of movement making speech visible, unique to the Steiner philosophy of Education. This poem describes a journey through sadness, overcoming sadness and strengthening the courage and light within our hearts. This poem is a means for teaching myself, and hopefully others too, that it’s much healthier to overcome the feeling of sadness and look forward to the future of your life. My poem represents a struggle through sadness, overcoming the sorrow and looking forward, creating ambitions, desires and dreams. You need to radiate your inner light to the world and glow!
Following is an excerpt of my poem entitled “Reflection and Desire” and also a photo of the accompanying painting entitled "Inner Sun"

My tears fill the darkness
My heartbeat fills the silence
My sorrows fill the silent dark

I’m searching for a path to follow
Looking for the clarity of wisdom
Yearning for the awareness of truth

I have developed the courage to dream
I have discovered the sun within my heart
I have found the sun within each of us

Returning to the beginning of this reflection, there is no obvious answer waiting to be discovered, it is often the journey which will teach us more! My understanding of the major work process is that students develop the capacity and awareness to make and trust their own choices and judgements. It is not about choosing what you want to achieve and signing a contract to say it will not change for the whole year, that would be cutting off endless possibilities, it is an unreasonable and unnatural process. The most amazing part of a major work, is the whole journey, the changes, the new impulses, the ups and downs, the smiles and the tears. We learn so much from our mistakes, and the hardships we encounter, as Richard Bach says: “There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts.”
Students from Lorien Novalis tend to be well developed human beings, with a well rounded view of the world. We are questioning individuals, not dumbed down citizens ready to accept everything which is thrown at us. We will ask questions, we strive to understand things fully!
"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment"~Emerson