I’m afraid
I’ll run out of adjectives. But I’m more afraid that my verbs will be
inappropriate. I don’t even know where to start this and what words to use. A
song whose lyrics include “we are called
to serve and we are called to lead the youth” keeps on playing on repeat. I
hope this can help me put all my emotions into writing, write my heart out.
Just like what I did almost three months ago in a letter that I have treasured
since then. The feeling is still stuck and so was the melody. The melody of promise and
friendship.
GENESIS
I was wearing the most normal shirt, a black city shorts and some dust
sandals when I went to our Division of Student Affairs to ask an adviser about
the schedule of a seminar. While discussing, he asked me about my year level.
Upon knowing, he then said, “Graduating
ka next year? Hali ka. Ipainterview kita!” He pulled me into a room
where almost ten people were holding sheets and pens with their unforgettably
intimidating gaze. The interview started then. They asked me like I was NBI’s
most wanted fugitive. But their questions in turn were so engaging and
challenging. I didn’t even realized that what became the most memorable
interview in my life lasted for almost an hour.
After a week, they announced that I made it to the Top 10 students of
the Mindanao State University – Main Campus whom they would indorse. They gave
me a stub which contained a username and a password. So it was official, an
insignificant student-leader like me
dared to be an applicant to the 14th Ayala Young Leaders Congress,
the most sought-after leadership gathering for college students in the country.
Despite that, I thought that AYLC was out of my league. Not in my
sweetest dreams neither in my old prayers. I felt like I had not yet gone out
of my shell. It was too early for me to crack it.
CRACKING THE SHELL
Applying for AYLC
had me spending nights of word searching, frustrated flashbacks and endless
digging up of certificates. My whole college life was spent on quiz bees,
entertainment through social media, MSU – Honors Program which is my
organization, and a little bit of academics. I am still on the Dean’s list but
I’m not that impressive. I am not that hard-working. I haven’t proved anything
at all. I used to tell myself all these things. As for the application, choosing my
Top 10 leadership positions, most significant college awards, community
involvement, etc. made me sleepless for weeks. Each of these items had to be
explained in at least two essays. Add to that the slowest internet connection
in the world that prolonged my agonizing online submission. Only Hercules would
not give up to that. But, I chose to be Hercules once in my life. It was the
idea that I don’t have much to be proud of in any of those requirements which
drained my willingness down to the sink. But it was the idea that I believe
that my words can be persuasive which kept on pushing me back to the surface. I
used to tell myself that all the small things that I’ve done could turn into
lessons other people might find worth-sharing. And so with a borrowed laptop
whose “n” key has popped out and a room where countless papers have scattered
and nothing was in its right place, I finally clicked that submit button. I considered myself finally out of the shell. The
thing is, I wasn’t certain if I cracked the shell right.
THE FACE-OFF
An employee in our
Dean’s office in the college texted me to fetch a letter from AYLC. Everyone
was already cheering on me but I doubted that the letter must have been a
letter to tell me that I cracked the shell wrong. To my surprise, the letter
said that I was invited for a panel interview in Makati. There was some sense
of fulfillment that congratulated a part of me that tried. Inside – an AYLC
logo. Personal Interview details. Plane tickets. Airplane! My heart melted.
Seeing the skyline of Manila which seemed like a thousand flashlights randomly
arranged overwhelmed me and the other interviewee from our school when we
landed around 7 pm in NAIA on November 22, 2011.
At the hotel, I
met many promising student-leaders mostly from Mindanao and some from the rest
of the country. Meals on the top floor and the lovely Makati sunrise added
the bliss of the opportunity. We got lost on our way to the interview location.
Shivers then followed my first step in the room where 4 big people waited to
have a conversation with me, a conversation that would define the next chapter of my odyssey.
Unpredictably, I found the interview very comforting and pleasing. I never felt
like they were supposed to give me a rating for it. It was more like they were
there smiling and listening, wanting to know me more as a person. Just like
parents trying to listen to their child after not seeing him for quite a
long time.
So there I went
home. I have brought back the books that were given to me by some friends in
Makati, the suit borrowed from my classmates which I used in the interview and
the joy that I have gone somewhere far, but not the expectation of getting into
the final list since I believed that I really was insignificant as a young
leader. In the interview, I shared my beliefs, vision and dreams but not what I
was, not what I did and not I have become because I didn’t have much to say to
them about these. And I considered the landing of the plane back in CDO the end
of my AYLC journey.
OPENING THE BIG DOOR
Through Facebook,
I became friends with some of the Top 179 students across the country who were
into consideration for the final list of the AYLC 2012 delegates. Everyone was
posting in their updates about receiving their congratulatory letter from Ayala weeks before. Others were posting “See you in the congress!” on each other’s
wall. That was the point where my slightest hope of joining the actual congress
vanished like a cloud of smoke blown hard. Blown away.
Recovery stage was
fast. I went on. Not until one morning when I received another text message
from the Dean’s office to get another letter from AYLC. I knew that both those
who passed and those who were not fortunate enough would receive a letter.
Judgment time. Fresh from eating my breakfast, I rushed to the office. I saw two
letters, one was a blue letter with an AYLC logo on the back and the other one
was a simple white letter. They handed me the white one. It bothered me to
think that only one of us would go and I thought it was her since hers was the
one with the logo, the usual letter we received earlier on the
application. So with fear, I read the letter. It was from a BIG Ayala
personality with his all-encompassing signature. Those words. Those paragraphs.
They made my knees and hands tremble and let some of my tears fall. I just
couldn’t believe that I was given the chance. I remembered all that I had been
through in that sojourn. All those things that I cried and thanked for. The
best part however was when after reading the letter, the eyes of my teachers
and advisers with their felicitous smiles spoke of rejoice and gladness. It was
this part where I realized that I was never alone from the start.
BEYOND THE OPENED DOOR
 |
| AYLC 2012 - SALIMBAY |
Finally, February
6, 2011 I flew again to Makati and spent the night in the same hotel but this
time, I finally met some of the people who I only conversed with in social
networks and whose faces are lined up with mine in a single pdf document I had
been looking at for few nights before the congress. Day Zero started and we finally went to
Alfonso, Cavite writing our own cherished memories thereafter. The rest that followed is a
part my existence that I cannot afford to forget. Narrating the entire journey
from that moment will be a challenging thing to do. One single post or write-up
won’t suffice. But I’m sharing this letter that I wrote in Don Bosco. This is my
favorite and most heartfelt part of the journey. This letter can explain many,
many things:
THE COVENANT
Dear batchmates,
Had
I not pushed through with the dream of pursuing my AYLC aspirations back when I
started the application, I wouldn’t have felt the rare sensation of the sunrays
on the side of the table as I write this letter, I wouldn’t have been fed with
some unforgettable meals I haven’t had for a long time, I wouldn’t have met 79
young dreamers like me, and definitely, I wouldn’t have had the best four
consecutive days of my life.
Joining
the congress has touched my heart more than I expected it to. It was the entire
package that opened the doors about the doubts I used to have about my
personality as an individual, my personal objectives, my strengths, my
weaknesses and my leadership. I enjoyed the entire duration of stretching the
“me” that I used to know and getting out of my comfort zone by sharing it with
others. I felt most alive when I came to a point where I seemed to look in a
mirror and discovered more details of my face when what I only used to see were
the lines in the silhouette. It was like I had a better idea of what I was not
and what I am going to be. It was the inspiration and energy within me that
have been awakened from a long subtle slumber. I could have figured it out
myself but this special experience unfolded many more things I only wished I
would know in an extensive manner rather than in a latent way.
I
have learned to become more open, more independent but trusting responsively,
more considerate about balancing my priorities and more readily accepting of my
limits. It is the lessons that are valuable enough and are not taught in school
which made me realize how bigger my world is compared to the world I used to
set limits with. I gained more friends on the way, more patience on the
challenges and more dreams that got bigger. My co-delegates, workshop and
outdoor groups co-members, the facilitators, the rapporteur and everyone else
who has in one way or another offered their hearts in this congress, you have
come together and realized many of my aspirations.
With
a renewed self and leadership, I will undertake changes by networking to many
others especially those who fall under the circles I serve, all of the inputs
that the congress has given me. I will make sure that everything I learned will
be realized by effective servant-leadership. I will try to device mechanisms in
which everyone in my organizations will feel that they are empowered, that they
are listened to, that they are motivated, that they are trusted and that they
are always going to be the people they want to be.
This
letter marks my promise, a covenant which I won’t just leave here in this
serene place but a manifestation that I recognize the success of the
transformation AYLC wanted me to undergo. And I am so happy I found it.
Always
yours,
NORBY
THE EPILOGUE
I thank my
batchmates: AYLC 2012 – SALIMBAY for many things I refuse to enumerate. Special
citation Workshop group 2 and Outdoor group C (Chuy!). To the enlightening Sir
Mario and Ma’am Alvie. To the patient Ate Ika and Kuya Olive. And to the
AYALA’s and their people for creating such a beautiful leadership congress. The
promise will stay on. It always will. #
