Decisions
Our lives are full of them, especially as young people we decide whether to take an extra safety precaution in a particular situation or not, how much money we spend each week to survive living at home through to what direction we want to take in life and what is exactly important to us.
I have just recently had to make probably the most difficult decision in my short life of almost 23 years. There is a lot of background to it so if you will bear with me, I will share the whole thing with you.
As most people know I am a member, and quite an active member of the student organisation AIESEC, and for the year of 2005 I underwent significant personal sacrifice to perform two full time volunteer roles in the one year, as Local Committee President of AIESEC at UniSA and as State Manager of AIESEC South Australia. Now, talk about bi - polar tendancies: I was managing a region of which I was a president of one of the committees within the region, try and keep a level head all the time when you are doing that. Now I thought I did a good job, and really enjoyed my year, however just at the end of the year, when I was just about to commit to running for the MC, I lost my drive. This happened somewhere between the introduction of the dreaded culture debate and the realisation I had been doing AIESEC for 40 hours a week for the past 12 months and couldn't guaruntee an honest year's work on our MC in Sydney.
So as a kind of consolation, I moved to Queensland. Still involved in AIESEC, but completely unsure of what role a person of 2 years experience as an LCP, one as a State Manager and already explored a rather large scope of the Leadership stage of the AIESEC XP, and not having enough money to explore the Exchange stage and still no completed degree after dedicating 2 years of my life to an organisation which I love, things were confusing, so I went to APXLDS in search of direction.
I wont lie, I was skeptical and didn't expect the MC to select me to go on the basis I had no role and had already been to an international conference (silly me didn;t realise that made me a perfect candidate, not having responsibilities to leave behind and being a good support to the head delegate). I have already endlessly posted about the conference experience, however my direction was clear: I was going to run for MCP at the end of the year, in my hometown of Adelaide. The scene was set.
My role in Queensland had since been forced, I was to co - OCP July National Conference in Brisbane. A heavier workload than I had intended to undertake, but I can never say no, especially when am half helping out a best mate (the State Manager was in a bind). The experience was a broad spectrum of emotions, lots of frustration, anger, fun and happiness was had in this 4 month role, and on the outside it ended successfully, but little did I know it would become the catalyst for the decision I have only just recently made.
Anyhoo, the conference finished, we made profit but things were slightly awry. I mentioned in a recent post that I was being questioned by my two best friends in an AIESEC sense which did not help, at the same time the amount of effort and commitment I was giving to the conference was also being questioned. These two events made me angry and frustrated with the one thing I always held faith in: My good friends and the people within AIESEC. Things were not good, a lot of self doubt entered into my mind, not a good thing for someone with very poor self perception. I wasn't licked yet tho, I was still pretty sure I would be running for MCP, MC at the very least.
Just recently, elections were held in Queensland for LCP and SM. If we look at the identity of AIESEC at a grassroots level, one of the things we claim is that we are not political at all, however all participants of these elections should be ashamed at the level of politics which there were in these elections, and the gay abandon at which they so called leaders of my new region dismiss the claims of foul play. A loaded sentence yes, however this is how I see it and these events have been the killer blow, no matter how I felt about myself, I still held faith that AIESEC was such a progressive organisation that it would not stoop to this level of politicking, that faith had been breached - I no longer want to contribute to AIESEC if my way of life is going to suffer from it.
In 2005 my way of life did suffer: study was put on hold, I gained weight, lost sleep, lost friends. True, I did gain a hell of a lot, but now I find myself a 22 year old, obese male facing a situation: I have no degree, am unhealthy and could spend 2007/08 in Sydney on minimal wage, with little opportunity to spend money on my health and it does not look like a wise decision for my general well being and sanity. The other things is, I know I would be a good MCP, I do think the country needs someone like me, to rally the people around a common cause, however I am not ready, willing or able to devote another 12 months to the cause, at least not at the moment anyway. Everytime I weigh up the pros and cons, there are a lot of pros to moving to Sydney and being on the MC or MCP, however most of them are not directly going to have an in turn positive effect on me and/or have a flip side.
So the decision I have recently made, after another trip to Sydney recently, numerous conversations with dear friends and realisations I am not as good a friend to some people as they are to me, I come to the decision that my short term future is in Queensland, not in Sydney as was going to be the case. I wont be running for MCP or the MC, and will be focussing my time in another localised role in AIESEC Queensland, my studies (just getting the fucking degree out of the way), my health (recently beginning a regime of 10 hours of tennis per week and 2 hours of bike riding per week and hoping to start swimming again soon), and erasing my debts and actually getting some cash behind me (something which I have only just begun doing).
Some of you may be shocked, saw it coming, happy, sad etc. I havent said much publicly, so here it is, I hope everyone reads it, asks me questions etc. I still love AIESEC, I still enjoy the environment I operate in, however the landscape has changed since I joined, and I fear I am part of a dying breed of partying AIESECers, but I will save my two cent contribution to the AIESEC Australia culture debate.
Till the next adventure,
Azz H.
I have just recently had to make probably the most difficult decision in my short life of almost 23 years. There is a lot of background to it so if you will bear with me, I will share the whole thing with you.
As most people know I am a member, and quite an active member of the student organisation AIESEC, and for the year of 2005 I underwent significant personal sacrifice to perform two full time volunteer roles in the one year, as Local Committee President of AIESEC at UniSA and as State Manager of AIESEC South Australia. Now, talk about bi - polar tendancies: I was managing a region of which I was a president of one of the committees within the region, try and keep a level head all the time when you are doing that. Now I thought I did a good job, and really enjoyed my year, however just at the end of the year, when I was just about to commit to running for the MC, I lost my drive. This happened somewhere between the introduction of the dreaded culture debate and the realisation I had been doing AIESEC for 40 hours a week for the past 12 months and couldn't guaruntee an honest year's work on our MC in Sydney.
So as a kind of consolation, I moved to Queensland. Still involved in AIESEC, but completely unsure of what role a person of 2 years experience as an LCP, one as a State Manager and already explored a rather large scope of the Leadership stage of the AIESEC XP, and not having enough money to explore the Exchange stage and still no completed degree after dedicating 2 years of my life to an organisation which I love, things were confusing, so I went to APXLDS in search of direction.
I wont lie, I was skeptical and didn't expect the MC to select me to go on the basis I had no role and had already been to an international conference (silly me didn;t realise that made me a perfect candidate, not having responsibilities to leave behind and being a good support to the head delegate). I have already endlessly posted about the conference experience, however my direction was clear: I was going to run for MCP at the end of the year, in my hometown of Adelaide. The scene was set.
My role in Queensland had since been forced, I was to co - OCP July National Conference in Brisbane. A heavier workload than I had intended to undertake, but I can never say no, especially when am half helping out a best mate (the State Manager was in a bind). The experience was a broad spectrum of emotions, lots of frustration, anger, fun and happiness was had in this 4 month role, and on the outside it ended successfully, but little did I know it would become the catalyst for the decision I have only just recently made.
Anyhoo, the conference finished, we made profit but things were slightly awry. I mentioned in a recent post that I was being questioned by my two best friends in an AIESEC sense which did not help, at the same time the amount of effort and commitment I was giving to the conference was also being questioned. These two events made me angry and frustrated with the one thing I always held faith in: My good friends and the people within AIESEC. Things were not good, a lot of self doubt entered into my mind, not a good thing for someone with very poor self perception. I wasn't licked yet tho, I was still pretty sure I would be running for MCP, MC at the very least.
Just recently, elections were held in Queensland for LCP and SM. If we look at the identity of AIESEC at a grassroots level, one of the things we claim is that we are not political at all, however all participants of these elections should be ashamed at the level of politics which there were in these elections, and the gay abandon at which they so called leaders of my new region dismiss the claims of foul play. A loaded sentence yes, however this is how I see it and these events have been the killer blow, no matter how I felt about myself, I still held faith that AIESEC was such a progressive organisation that it would not stoop to this level of politicking, that faith had been breached - I no longer want to contribute to AIESEC if my way of life is going to suffer from it.
In 2005 my way of life did suffer: study was put on hold, I gained weight, lost sleep, lost friends. True, I did gain a hell of a lot, but now I find myself a 22 year old, obese male facing a situation: I have no degree, am unhealthy and could spend 2007/08 in Sydney on minimal wage, with little opportunity to spend money on my health and it does not look like a wise decision for my general well being and sanity. The other things is, I know I would be a good MCP, I do think the country needs someone like me, to rally the people around a common cause, however I am not ready, willing or able to devote another 12 months to the cause, at least not at the moment anyway. Everytime I weigh up the pros and cons, there are a lot of pros to moving to Sydney and being on the MC or MCP, however most of them are not directly going to have an in turn positive effect on me and/or have a flip side.
So the decision I have recently made, after another trip to Sydney recently, numerous conversations with dear friends and realisations I am not as good a friend to some people as they are to me, I come to the decision that my short term future is in Queensland, not in Sydney as was going to be the case. I wont be running for MCP or the MC, and will be focussing my time in another localised role in AIESEC Queensland, my studies (just getting the fucking degree out of the way), my health (recently beginning a regime of 10 hours of tennis per week and 2 hours of bike riding per week and hoping to start swimming again soon), and erasing my debts and actually getting some cash behind me (something which I have only just begun doing).
Some of you may be shocked, saw it coming, happy, sad etc. I havent said much publicly, so here it is, I hope everyone reads it, asks me questions etc. I still love AIESEC, I still enjoy the environment I operate in, however the landscape has changed since I joined, and I fear I am part of a dying breed of partying AIESECers, but I will save my two cent contribution to the AIESEC Australia culture debate.
Till the next adventure,
Azz H.
