Always have a clear vision of the GOAL

I got the chance to bump again with this photo from our Basic Training Management Course last December 2012.

It was the third day of the training, our session started 8am.

We were tasked to choose a single photo which will best describe ourselves at that very moment.

There were two long tables filled with different photos and we were only about less than 30 participants.

We were sitting in circle. From the moment the instructions were given, I started staring at the photos.

Then I was thinking, "what am I feeling right now?" Then I began thinking, "this activity is too personal." 

But the real thing is I was thinking, "how will I be able to choose a photo to describe how I feel wherein I myself doesn't know how I really feel."

Let me check:

One. A very personal activity at 8 in the morning. 

Two. It was really cold inside the training room.

Three. I want to pick more than 1 photo.

Four. It was December.

Five. I am at this training course exactly a month after Pao left.

The timer started ticking, my fellow participants started approaching the tables looking through every photograph. Some picked theirs instantly, some took a little time deciding on what to pick.

I also looked through the photos. There were different photographs that I think I can relate to how I feel and that I can justify. 

At the back of my mind, I was thinking, "I can easily grab any photo, stare at it and presto! I can relate it to how I am feeling." It didn't happen, the first look, I had some photos on my mind, in the second look, I observed my fellow participants, and in my last look, I grab the photo not knowing why I actually took it.

Soon as I reach my seat, I sat down, holding the photo in my right hand.

Then I looked at it. I found my self feeling really weird. 

In the pile of photos, I saw photos of beaches, sunset, smiling faces, other photos that I can easily relate to myself but I didn't choose those, instead this photo choose me.

In the photograph, there were visible roofs and a bit of irregular-shaped stones, but two things struck me most, there were trees, so many trees and behind these trees, there's a light, a light shining so bright.

I didn't know what happened, but the moment I opened my mouth, shared my story, relate the photograph to me, everything fell into its proper place. 

I am uttering the right and exact words I want to say, I am constructing the right and exact statements that I want to impart, I suddenly felt connected with the photograph, or the photograph and me is actually feeling the same.

"I choose the photo because I saw the light."

That's what I said.

My justification?

"A tree came from a seed same as I started as a child. As I grow old, the seed also grows. It is to say that as I grow, the hindrances, challenges and struggles I am facing also grows. 

Life is tough, it becomes tougher and sometimes I am thinking it is the toughest.

But like in the photograph, you'll see the light. Seeing this light is an enough reason to continue surpassing these challenges, winning every battle and proving to your self that no matter how difficult and hopeless each hindrances may be, there's always the light from a far. It's not totally unreachable, it's just unreachable now.

I may need to take the long and difficult road but you see nobody says I can't achieve it.

Long as I have a clear vision of the GOAL, I know, I'll get there."