It's Worth the Pain

The last quarter of 2014 has been, by far, the most challenging quarter of my life. Mainly because it was the quarter when I gave up my job at Project PEARLS for graduate studies. Well, it wasn’t really that I regret my choices as I believe we are responsible for the choices we make. The thing was, I think I didn’t have enough time to digress from the routine I have for the last seven months, like going to the communities I embraced and almost made my own, the children who greet me every time I go the areas we serve, the volunteers who I became friends with. Maybe it’s true that it’s really hard to just simply set aside something you’ve loved and you’ve considered your life, but life has to move forward and there will always come a time where new beginnings should be made.

It’s hard to build another story from scratch, but it’s always worth the pain.

In November, I started going back to school for my graduate studies. I was able to pass the Polytechnic University of the Philippine’s qualifying examinations for the Master’s Program, and eventually enrolled under Masters in Communication with Specialization in Communication Management program. The first few weeks were as boring as one could imagine, but the succeeding weeks were equally thrilling and insightful. The good thing about the liberal education PUP is promoting is that it invites healthy discussions, and accepts constructive criticisms and scrutiny. There were days where debates could really heat up (especially in our Public Information Campaigns class, where our professor is the Communications Head of the Government Information Office, and the class is a mixture of social democrats, re-affirmists, humanists, etc.)

While it was a good start for a new story, there were still a lot of questions. Why did I leave my job for this? Was the decision right? What would happen to me in the process? Will employers still accept me? Where did I go wrong?

There were too many questions I never dared to answer anyway. Simply because I already was too worried about the future I forgot to worry about the present. I was too engrossed with the problems that only exist in my mind. This 2015, I told myself there should be more than just simply asking.

           

One morning I told myself to stop asking why and start knowing how. I realized there are still more work to be done and life is a never-ending process of giving and taking, of loving and losing, of ending and beginning.

I’m still nowhere in the middle, but what’s more important is that I already started.

It’s hard to build another story from scratch, but it’s always worth the pain.