Last week, I had the amazing pleasure to attend a TEDx Talk. For those of you who don't know, TED aims to share ideas worth sharing and they do that by organizing talks. x stands for an independently organized TED event. Yesterday was my first, and hopefully not last time attending TEDxADMU and this year's theme is "Why Coordinate." The organizers provide us with a brief explanation behind the theme:
"This year's theme seeks to emphasize the value of remembering that we are together as people, that we share the very fundamental characteristic of being human, and that the value stretches on to the future where we continue to live in a society that looks out for each other and works together to create a vastly improving and dynamic home for everyone that is geared towards building the nation."
I have to say, the theme is really setting us up for a feels talk. This conference will be about our life, our different passions, and how no matter how different we may seem to be, we will always have that one commonality - we are all human - and that should be the core to any nation building activity.
The speakers did not disappoint.
I'd like to share some of the things I've learned from the different speakers yesterday. I'm cutting them up into sections because I'm not done with the last 4 talks and also because this would be a long and boring post if I d
1. If you want to make it big in the world, come as you are. - Jim Paredes
I think this is very powerful, and not just in the context of what our speaker, Jim Paredes, was pertaining to (Original Pilipino Music). It speaks of finding our voice, our identity as a people, and cultivating that so that the world will take notice.
We have been living in a society that idolizes the Western culture so much. We dress like them, eat like them, and talk like them, but we keep forgetting that we are not them. We aren't Westerners. I mean, look at the map guys. We are from the East, technically speaking. People now are trying to eradicate every single bit of Filipino in them to be seen as world-class citizens. But they are missing the point. If you take away everything Filipino, who will you be then? You will be devoid of any identity because you're not a Westerner but you don't want to be a Filipino.
What perplexes me is that a lot of people from my generation don't even fully understand what being a Filipino means, yet they are so quick to shove it out the door. Do we know what the Filipino identity is? And don't you dare answer me with the textbook answers of the national animal (carabao), the national tree (narra), the national flower (sampaguita), the national fruit (mango), or even the national hero (Jose Rizal). That's not what I mean. Do you really think that a mango exeplifies who we are? Does a carabao perfectly capture everything that it means to be a Filipino? Who are we as a people? Do we know? Or did the lines get so blurry from the years of trying to erase our Filipino-ness (is that a word in English? In Filipino, it's pagka-Pilipino, pagkatao)?
Sure, the reality may be that we don't know what our identity is anymore. The lines may be blurred, but we should see this as a challenge. We can still see the lines of the past. That will always be part of who we are. But I can also see a blank space, a space where we can write our own story. We, as the youth, have the power to define the lines. Who is the Filipino for us?
2. Hard work manufactures opportunities. - Paul Rivera
Paul Rivera entitled his talk, Go where you are not supposed to go. He talks about his life and how he went where he was not supposed to go. Paul was born to a 19 year-old single mother in Cavite. People like Paul aren't supposed to make it big, as he said. Paul and his family migrated to the States when he was a kid and they didn't have much. Paul attended Berkeley, got into Google, and then left his job to start Kalibrr. Kalibrr is an organization that tries to solve unemployment and underemployment by matching peoples' skills with the right jobs. If you take a look at where he came from, everything that happened in his life was not supposed to happen. That's just not how the story goes for people like him.
He proved that wrong at every turn. He learned earlier in life that everything you wanted in life, you had to work for. You shouldn't wait around for opportunities to find you. You make these opportunities for yourself. I think that it is powerful advice, and he wasn't the first person to give that. Brandon Stanton, the man behind Humans of New York, said this, "There are so many people that use following your dream as an excuse not to work. But in reality, following your dreams, successfully, is nothing but work." Even older than him, Thomas Edison says, "Genius is 1% Inspiration and 99% Perspiration." It just really goes to show that elbow grease can get you places, even places you're not supposed to go.
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