Staying Positive

Meidyatama Suryodiningrat once wrote about how the ignorance of middle class will shut out the lower, poorer class eventually. In a country when there are millions of people who can’t get access to clean water, the middle class in fact drink more from the bottled water, instead of expressing their concern and anger to the government for the injustice.

When I read the writing, I felt embarrassed for being part of the middle class who did nothing for betterment. I joined a lot of initiatives to create changes that I am dreaming of, but I still go to the malls sometimes on weekends, enjoy chatting with my friends, and talk about all unimportant stuffs, including gossips. I wasted my time taking care of myself, my friendships, but not to dedicate my time to teach orphanage, homeless children, or people who need my help as a teacher when I actually have the capacity to do so.

If people like me were so many, then what are the hopes for Indonesia? We are the young generation, we were told so many times that we will lead the future, but the real question will be how will we bring welfare to the people when we are too busy with our image, our own wealth, our own family, our own business and we forget those people that is powerless and who need helping hands?

Only then I took part in one of the foundation which objectives is to help develop young leaders in Indonesia. As cliché as it may sound, the program trains 60 university students across the country each year, help them vision Indonesia in 20 years time, and vision themselves in the roadmap – what will they be doing in within that period, how will they contribute to the country in 20 years from now.

Different themed-forums and fieldwork approach were introduced to these participants to help them improve their leadership skills, with the hope that they will be the true Indonesian leaders in different sectors in the future.  After running for five years, up to date the foundation has been able to enhance the leadership capacity of 280 students who have proven their work across discipline and initiatives.

Drowning in my daily job to conduct the program, I often think that I am not making enough impact I have been dreaming of. There were times when the administrative stuffs took over your overall ideation about helping students develop their potentials. Yet, when you got to interview them, listening to what they have done and what they have in mind, you will be overblown.

That happened to me yesterday, when I got to opportunity to see them in person, digging their whole aspiration and vision for the future, not only for themselves, but to their hometown, their country and society.

You may call them naive, or such, but you can't believe how many people will actually lead Indonesia in the future, how many entrepreneurs we will have in 20 years time and provide jobs for the rest of the nation. Job opportunities, I say, will be plenty. Innovation, I can assure, is one word that will still exist for longer time than we imagine, and inspire many people to lead change.

But then, reality is not as nice as we think it is. I can say, I live in totally two different worlds, challenging ones, especially because I can get access to confidential information about the intrigues that politicians nowadays use to gain wealth and power. You will definitely feel discouraged when you find out about the injustice and worst law enforcement that we actually implemented. Nothing is free from conspiracy, nor interests. The citizen is actually a puppet that will not change a single thing. It is a harsh and painful truth, but it is still the truth.

So then you face a dilemma between staying hopeful at one end, and feeling powerless at the other end. Which type of perspective would you then choose?

Up to date, I realize that I always feel energized to find people so passionate about their vision, communities and dreams. I just want to forget a little about the reality, and keep the spark of change alive inside my heart. The participants we chose to help develop throughout the program, I believe will be a very good investment, despite the quality of output that we can't never guarantee.

So yes, I choose to stay positive this time. 

Again, as Phillia always said, "To lit one candle is better than to curse the darkness." Why stop believing?