What I have to offer
Based on your actual strengths, values, and interests. Not what you think you're "supposed" to offer.
10 Essential Skills in this module
4Interpersonal Relations
5Adaptability & Leadership
7Civic Engagement
9Knowledge Application
Lesson 11.3
Your Strengths, Your Community
Putting what you know about yourself to work.
You already know more about yourself than you've had a chance to use. This lesson is about putting it to work.
Everything you've already figured out
This semester, you've built up a surprising amount of self-knowledge, usually one piece at a time, in different modules, for different reasons. Put together, it looks like this:
- Career Coach (Module 6): the kinds of work and environments that interest you
- HIGH5 (Module 7): your top strengths, what you're naturally good at and energized by
- The Values Card Sort (Module 7): what actually matters to you, when you get specific
- Your Collaboration Snapshot (Module 10): how you work with others, and what you need from a team
- The last lesson: a lens for seeing how communities actually work
Most of the time these stay separate: a result here, a reflection there. This lesson puts them in the same room, because together they help you decide how you want to show up in your communities, on terms that fit who you are.
Why "I don't have time" is usually half the story
If you've ever been invited to get involved in something (a club, a volunteer opportunity, a cause you cared about) and said "I just don't have time," you're not alone, and you're probably not lying. But time is often the easy answer, because the real one is more complicated: I don't know what I'd be walking into, I don't want to let people down, and I'm worried I'd end up doing something I'd dread.
That's a normal reaction to stepping into a system you can't see yet, which is what the last lesson was about. And if not knowing the system is part of what makes it hard, having your own terms clear going in makes a real difference.
What I have to offer, and what I don't
Before you say yes, or no, to getting more involved in something, know two things about yourself:
What I'm not available for
At least for now, at least at first. A limit, a role you don't want, a kind of task that drains you.
Naming both before you're in the middle of something changes the whole experience. Instead of slowly discovering your limits, and maybe feeling guilty about them, you walk in with your terms already clear, to yourself and often to the people you're working with.
Worked example: Jordan and the community garden
- The first reaction
- "I don't really have time for a whole commitment right now." That's true; Jordan is busy. But sitting with it longer, Jordan notices something else: they're picturing being asked to run a whole section, show up every single week, or be the new person who has to figure out a system nobody explains. None of that has been asked. It's what Jordan is bracing for.
- What Jordan has to offer
- Jordan's Module 7 results include being a steady, reliable presence and someone who notices small details, and one of their top values is being outdoors and connected to something growing. So Jordan's honest offer: "I can show up every other Saturday morning. I'm good at consistent, hands-on tasks like weeding and watering."
- What Jordan isn't available for
- "I don't want an organizing or leadership role right now. I have too much going on this semester. I'd rather just show up and do the work."
Jordan says something close to this at the meeting, as an honest starting point, not a list of demands. The garden needs exactly that: reliable people doing hands-on work on a predictable schedule. Jordan wouldn't have known it was a fit, or felt comfortable saying yes, without getting clear first.
Your turn
Go back to the community from the last lesson, or pick a different one, including something you'd like to get more involved in.
What I have to offer
Based on your strengths, values, and interests, what's something real you could bring to this community? Not what you think you "should" offer, but something that fits you.
What I'm not available for
What's one thing you'd want to be upfront about, rather than discovering it later?
Saying it out loud
How would it feel to say both of these before getting more involved?
Write your answers in Step 3 of the Community Snapshot.
Online sections
The Getting the Call journal in Blackboard lets you try this on a new scenario: a group connected to something you care about reaches out to you.
AI Literacy BE Reflective
If you want a thinking partner
Try: "Here's what I know about my strengths and values: [list them]. I'm thinking about getting more involved in [describe the group, no names]. Help me think through what I could genuinely offer, and what I might want to be upfront about not being available for."
Then check what comes back against what you know about yourself. Does it sound like you? The mix of strengths, values, and limits that's true for you has to come from you.
Your stories are already here
The rest of this module is your working time for your STAR(T) Stories. Everything you've pulled together here (strengths, values, interests, and how you see your communities and your place in them) is exactly what those stories are made of. The next Trail Tip shows you where to start.