My colleague and I were in the auto, travelling towards the meeting spot , a Cafe, when we received a text from Mr. Ken , ” I have reached . ”
No, we were not late for the meeting, he was early, and he had reached before we did .
Upon reaching the Cafe, we spotted him sitting quietly at an empty table. We saw an elderly man dressed in a simple blue button down shirt, the keys of his bike, an old model of Nokia 3100 and a black helmet kept in front , on the table.
Mr. Ken smiled at us politely while we introduced ourselves.
For the next fifteen minutes, we explained to him why we had come to meet, to detail, why we wanted him to speak at one of our events that promoted cross-cultural student exchange through an independent organization called AIESEC.
AIESEC has been working towards a more peaceful world for the past sixty nine years by facilitating global exchanges , mobilizing youth across six continents to work in projects based on global causes and issues.
To give a little bit of context, we wanted a person to speak to and inspire our college students to go abroad for this exchange. And Mr. Ken was the right person to do so, having spent his entire life out of his comfort zone, volunteering for various social causes simply because he believed in doing good to people.
Mr. Ken , however, did not seem convinced.
“How do you understand the values of these people who are going on exchange? Do you send them for their and your own selfish interest? What do you do to make young people recognize whether they have values that would urge them to volunteer abroad?”
All those questions came after we had already explained why we send students on exchange and what we send them for. Then why did they come? And why did we not respond to him at the blink of an eye?
This man here was not questioning the basics of our organization. He was questioning the meaning of the activities we do , of the things we speak today, after almost sixty nine years of the organization’s inception. And his questions triggered not a response, but a series of thoughts.
To understand the values of our students while speaking to them about the plus points of a volunteer global exchange was something that never occurred to us.
I remembered while reading a certain book , I came across the difference between Character and Personality. Character being something that defines who we are and what we are made of while Personality is our outer image that helps everyone perceive us as something.
Values, by and large, form the basics of our character that makes up our core. Values such as Compassion, Honesty, Kindness , et cetera , are simple pure traits of our very being that reflect out through each of our most humble , selfless and real actions. Values are ours, completely and wholly.
”Do your exchange students feel the compassion to do good in society? Is that why they volunteer abroad? If they do, how do you recognize it? And if they don’t, what is the point?”
These questions seemed to me more than just relevant. These questions got me analyzing my actions in the organization , and the purpose of each of those actions.
Of course, the kind of experience a global exchange provides to a young person of eighteen or nineteen is unparalleled, and I say that having gone through such an experience myself. It is an experience that has the power to change lives. We realize that after we come back from the exchange, at least most of us do.
The question that however remains is , before going on exchange, how do we know whether we really want to volunteer for a global cause? How do we know whether we are doing it out of compassion for the world? Or out of the desire to make a mark on our CV?
How do we, as facilitators of this beautiful experience, ensure that every person volunteering is doing so because his / her values as an individual prompt him/ her to contribute to good in society?
When I actually think of it, so many times we try to inspire with the aim to influence others to believe in what we do rather than first understanding the values which we are trying to inspire into actions.
An experience is something that can only be half delivered, because an experience is something that for the larger part is created and molded by self. Therefore where the talk of self comes, the talk of values of self also emerges. How an experience is molded would of course be a reflection of values of self.
We run after statistics as lot. Because we believe that our numbers reflect our growth and development. But do we ever sit and analyze how real those numbers actually are?
A very common example to relate this to would be that of a student who studies for marks but believes that his capacity cannot be measured by exams because maybe his passion lies somewhere else. Similarly, we find ourselves running after numbers and success a lot of times, without understanding first whether we are respecting our values which has prompted us to begin in the first place.
For me, it was a very different business meeting.
Although the purpose with which we had gone, was fulfilled in the end, we came back home with few raging thoughts and multiple reflections. Let’s say, we learnt something in that space of an hour or so.
Every single action done by anyone would be a reflection of their values. As externals trying to inspire and influence such actions, it is important to understand deeply the existence of the values. Developing a personality to suit something can be relatively easy. But recognizing and understanding one’s values is definitely much more of a challenge.
As a young student who is engaged in the activity of facilitating international exchanges for fellow students and providing them with leadership experiences, I feel it is important for me to have an understanding of the values of the person I am sending abroad on a volunteer project. I guess a lot of you reading this might relate.
To end I would say, in the general course of things as well, let’s not forget to keep asking this question to ourselves :
Any time we do something, are we able to understand the values that propel us to do, or are we getting lost in the influence of others’ ?
Unraveller0001 