By Caitlin Caingcoy
(This is an original transcript of Caitlin’s speech at the first TFCC – The Filipino Champions Talk, Café Talks in Calgary, Alberta)
Good morning everyone! Once again, my name is Caitlin Caingcoy. I’m 15 years old, attending Bishop O’Byrne High School as a student in it’s Pre-IB – International Baccalaureate – or simply, it’s Honours Program. I am also a youth leader in River of Life Alliance Church. I lead NEXTGEN – our youth group, as well as our Junior High subgroup, NEXTGEN PG. This year, I plan to continue excelling academically and showing my leadership skills towards things I’m passionate about. Thus, the reason I am here this morning – to chat about how to start this year right and to convince every one of you to do it with me.
Everyone has their dreams, their own goals, but in my 15 years of life, or my two years of stepping out of my shell and reaching out to many different types of people, I’ve found that humans have a common goal and that it’s to find success or be successful. You don’t even need to have many experiences to see that in the people around you. Your dad wants to achieve success in his career; your friend wants to grab the top rank in the class; your boyfriend/girlfriend wants to be a pro basketball player – everyone wants to find success!
Linking this back, that’s because everyone has a goal. Friends, we also need to realize that success isn’t just about achievements on papers or trophies or status. One of your goals could be having more family dates or being able to express yourself more. You can find success in relational or psychological growth as well! Whatever your goal may be, I believe that there are 2 steps that are significant to achieving ANY goal and it’s literally to KNOW your goals and work hard for them. Anyone can give you a fancy schmancy list on how to achieve success or link you an article to a shortcut to success but no matter what, no matter how simple the goal may be, knowing your goal and working for it will still be involved.
Folks, just putting it out here now, there’s no way to escape working hard for your goals or things you want. Absolutely no way. Unless you have money and are willing to pay someone to do your dirty work for you of course – just kidding. Even then! You’d still need to work hard to earn that money! Life is hard, and then you die. It’s you who decides whether you achieve success in your life or not. Think about it. It’s apples vs. oranges – you either want to achieve or not, work hard for it or just look at it from a distance.
My parents own a private Montessori school in the Philippines and every year or two they go back and forth to manage it as Headmaster and Vice Headmaster of the school. In 2013, I went to the Philippines with my mom and stayed there for, I believe, a year and a half. During that year and a half, I studied in the said school for my 6th grade.
Now, for those who grew up in the Philippines, you’ll know this, and for those that didn’t, you’ll know now – the Philippines is VERY competitive in terms of grades and ranking in school. If you go to the Philippines for the first time to study, expect a fresh shock. I kid you not; it will literally change the way you think of school. It changed mine for sure.
Anyways, I vividly remember looking at my mom on the plane and telling her that I wanted to graduate as the Valedictorian. And she said, “well, you have to work hard for it then.” It wasn’t because she didn’t believe in me, it was because she KNEW the atmosphere that lives in schools over in the Philippines. I didn’t catch the memo. I came in there, and I was shocked. I failed my first quiz in the Philippines. Not to mention, I didn’t know how to speak Filipino. I could understand, but that didn’t help at all when it came to oral Filipino tests. Y’already know who was crying in her corner. I WAS LEGIT NOT READY. People around me, even if they didn’t mean to, helped in shutting down the thought that I could ever be the Valedictorian. They said things like, “Oh you have to have studied here since preschool to be able to be a Valedictorian,” or “Oh, you need to know Filipino because all your averages need to be high.” Sometimes they even said sorry at the end! I’m not sure if they apologized because they were being a friend and telling me what they believed was the truth or whether they were trying to shut me down without feeling bad. Whatever it was, their words sure did help me struggle.
Even though I was negatively impacted by their words, I didn’t stop working for my goal. I knew I was smart; I wouldn’t let it go to waste by not trying at all. Also, I trusted my mom. She wouldn’t tell me to work for it if I couldn’t earn it. Later on, she did tell me that whatever they said wasn’t true at all – except for the high averages. I fixed that by going to a Filipino tutor every single day after school. I would not miss a day even though I kind of hated it and thought it was boring. That’s because I had a long-term goal in my mind, and even if it was hard at the moment, I knew that if I kept on going, I could make it.
Now we’re a week before the graduation. My friend and I were called into the office by a teacher. I made it. I was to graduate as the Valedictorian and my friend, the salutatorian. I could not express how happy I was at that moment. All my hard work had paid off! The studying, the extra effort put into projects, and the painful Filipino tutorials – they were all worth it! That’s because I had a goal- I recognized it, and I worked hard for it. Remember when I said that it was really competitive in the Philippines? Yeah, I walked out of the office, and I already had a beef with someone LOL. No words had to be said – you could tell.
Now, there’s a quality that I believe, will help you bridge your way to success. It’s perseverance. The ability to persevere. Being able to persevere through trials you have to face is one of the key qualities you must have to find success.
If you can’t laugh when faced with provocation, then it was nice seeing you – time to go home. If I didn’t continue going to tutorials or if I gave in to whatever people had to say to prevent me from achieving my goal, then I wouldn’t be standing here right now, talking about my success. This isn’t saying that you should put on a mask and harden your heart. It’s about being strong and believing in yourself – believing that you can overcome.
Being strong isn’t brushing off your feelings, it’s acknowledging them and being able to move on. Vent to a friend if you have to, cry if you have to – I cried a LOT! So, don’t be afraid to cry and to let out your feelings. It’s only natural to feel – we’re humans, and we need to acknowledge our feelings. That way, we can keep on walking and finding new goals we can work on! This 2018 will be a year of success for each and every one of us. I can already tell. I’m Caitlin Caingcoy and it was a pleasure speaking with you.
Thank you, Caitlin, for sharing your speech with FCM!
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