Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Set a clear target, and never give up

I started my responsible as a Junior Division PTC since I was 13. At the beginning I wasn’t participating a lot and to me, I felt like I was just the same as the Junior Division who comes to the meeting. As for the prep meet, I was either lacking of the courage to speak out, or feeling that I wasn’t eligible to give any comment.

Until one day, a PIC asked me: “Why are you just sitting there, can you give us some ideas?” Just one sentence, I felt so bad. I wished to tell them that I was just lacking of the courage to talk. Nevertheless, I still have to thank that PIC. Since then, I started to voice out my opinion in each meeting. At the same time, I began to be more serious as a Junior Division PTC.

After finishing my SPM on 2005, my main PIC moved to a new place and gave me the responsible to be a main PIC. I was surprised but still, I took up the responsible. After a few months, I faced a big challenge. It’s the preparation of the 2006 2nd Junior Division Cultural Night event. This event was done together by 2 chapters. I participated in the 1st Junior Division Cultural Night event, but I wasn’t in charge of much duties. Hence, I wasn’t familiar with the operation and process of it. But now, I would have to know every single operation in that event. I was afraid and stressed as I didn’t know where to begin.

There were lots of unforgettable incidents during the preparation. In the beginning of the preparation, the previous PICs came back and helped out a little. Unfortunately, they were staying far and due to the problem of time arrangement, they stopped coming to aid us. Back then our Junior Division committee was lacking of WDs and YDs. Most of them were still in lower secondary and I was the eldest PIC as only 18 years old.

Lacking of experience, I faced lots of problems, including relationship problems with the teammates and members, transport problem, leadership problem, academic problem, problems on arrangements of extra curricular activities from my school, and family matters. All the troubles I was facing made me so stressed up. Back then I wasn’t standing firm in my faith, and so I kept on complaining. Every night when I close my eyes, all I could see was my teacher scolding me, other people’s complaints on me, and that I still have lots of things I haven’t done yet. Soon, I became depressed and sensitive. I always thought that someone’s talking something bad about me every time I turned around. This is how we went through the 2006 JD Cultural Night, with a hard time.

After the cultural night, I irresponsibly and irrationally quitted the responsible of being the main PIC. My reason was that I needed to focus on my academic (STPM). As you could see, my results are falling like a rock from the sky since I was preparing for the Cultural Night. I failed all 4 of my subjects. I felt so sad and wanted to leave the committee. Unfortunately, nobody even cared about my complaints after 6 months, and nobody wanted to continue my duty at all. Without any other choices, I passed my responsible to someone who wasn’t quite fit for it. Hence, the Junior Division meeting became worse each and every time. At the same time, the leaders and PICs were blaming me on this. I was known to be an irresponsible YWD. Since then, I didn’t even have the courage to attend other meetings. At the end, I didn’t even get to carry out my duty as a leader of YWD.

The only activity of the organization that I actually went to was Cultural Group – Kiboo Kotekitai. I was down for 6 months and I lost the spirit to do anything. There was one day I saw my mother waking up at 3am and chanted for me. She told me that she was so sad for my problems. Oh, I was even more depressing when I heard that!

One day, the Kiboo Kotekitai chief and I went to home-visit a cultural group member who hasn’t been attending the practice for a long time. During the home-visit, I found out that I couldn’t even give a word of encouragement because I’m lost too, and I was still looking for my direction. However, this home-visit actually became a new turning point of my life. It opened up my heart and I started gaining back my faith.

I started searching back my direction. Other than that, I even started reading the New Revolution. I read about Sensei saying to chant and pray seriously. I went back to the beginning point of my faith; I stood up again, grabbing my faith and courage. Within 6 months of dialogue with my Kiboo Kotekitai leader, chanting, and reading of New Revolution, once again I found the energy to start it all over again. In the same time, I started to release all the unhappy things that have past and went back to being a JD committee. This required a massive amount of courage. First of all, I need to face, review and change all the mistakes I’ve done. Sometimes I could hear words that are uncomfortable for me, but I clearly knew that it was my karma. The most important thing is, I love kids, and this is a duty I must carry out. President Ikeda said: “Living is to challenge, challenge is for life, as long as we challenge seriously, we will get protection. For our victory, let’s challenge!” Finally, I took up the responsible to be a JD PIC again.

Thinking back again, I’m thankful that I had a great fall when I was 18. If it wasn’t for that lesson, I wouldn’t even understand the spirit of mentor and disciple, and what is courage today. “A courageous person is a person we stand up again after falling, and continue challenging.” This is what President Ikeda teaches us. I’; remember that forever.

Other than that, I would like to share 2 other guidance in the New Revolution that touches my heart:

“In a society like a company or our organization, we would feel troubled by relationship problems sometimes. But no matter how dangerous that road may be, as long as we have a great horsepower engine, and operating well, we could always keep move forward.”

“You have your mission

I have my mission too…”

And of course, there’s still a slogan I would never forget, it’s the Kiboo-Koteikitai slogan which says: “Clear target, never give up.”

Thank you.

Shared by,

Cheong Pooi San.

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Written at 11:56 PM by Paper Pilot.