A way to experience changes

It´s weird how getting used to some things make you forget how life used to be earlier. And how some things you could only dream of are now so reachable and normal.
For example travelling and meeting some friends you wasn´t sure you will meet again. Exactly one week ago I came from Holland where WENA/CEE ER meeting in Rotterdam took place. First day was a training provided by ING and secong day was for our meeting. It was great networking and place where to get new ideas how to improve my work here to get better results. Apart from the meeting I also met an old friend Eric who was a trainee in Estonia in 2003.
And tomorrow the whole MC team with current LCPs substitutes goes to Riga to meet CEE Director Mike and other Baltic MCs.
Travelling around seems normal but when to think of it how many people at my age I know who can do it. Except our MC team..
The best is once in a while to sit down and think back to really feel and acknowledge the experience we are going through.

/Liisi/

Change, footprints and success

Only constant thing in the world is change. Some days ago I discussed with a friend who I hadn’t seen for a while how people change and how we ourselves have changed. And then it hit me again that actually not many young people are conscious about their development learning and striving a change in themselves.
One factor what makes it possible in my case is for sure the working environment, which constantly provides me the possibility to improve – mentoring, feedback, different tools etc.
I’m one of the lucky ones, because as it seems, in Estonia at least, that there are a lot more organisations and companies than I expected that don’t consider their employees´ development as an important factor and the topic doesn’t get enough attention.
Still we can’t deny that it is important. The thought from the conference (Sinu Valik 06) I attended on Saturday was that in the end no victory or goal achieved is as important as the positive change striven in you while achieving it.
But can we blame only environment around ourselves for not being able to draw the attention needed for this?
One of my favourite quotes has lately been: “Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some people move our souls to dance. They awaken us to a new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom, and make the sky more beautiful to graze upon. Some people stay in our lives awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, and then we are never, ever the same.”
I accidentally read it from one conference output posting made by Alexis (PD in Austria). And it really made me think. Approximately a week ago I discovered another version of it straight on my bookshelf. Thank you EB 04/05 for the nice book:)
“Life is full of people who will make you laugh, cry, smile until your face hurts. But the ones who leave their footprints on your soul are the ones that keep your life going.”
Although I don’t agree entirely with the last quote, still there is a lot of people who are able to inspire us and make to strive the change in ourselves, just if we are opened to that.
We never get more than we have deserved. And in life even if there is always more than one gold medal, if we are not yet worth it, there is nothing to do, we just don’t get it. In this case the only option for winning it is that we have to strive a change and become better – as simple as that.
But how big is the environment’s role in making the change after all and how much depends on the person himself? That I’m still trying to figure out.

Kaisa – learning to succeed

Wow! Energy

Not too long ago I had one of the best and for sure one of the most memorable experiences of my AIESEC career and it has not been a short one:) Being part of the Energy facilitation team gave me many different experiences, emotions and thoughts. Some things I want to share about what does being a faci mean in such a conference:
- It is challenging. It always means stepping out of your comfort zone and stretching yourself a bit more. Especially for me it was, because I’ve not had too much facilitation experience before and after all Baltic Energy is the biggest conference in Baltics ever.
- It is tiring. 3 days long pre-meeting plus 3 days full conference was not easy, but somehow during all this preparation, excitement and challenges you somehow overcome this tiredness. The passion just keeps you going to do the best you can in every moment and in every situation.
- It is an awesome learning experience. One of the great things about AIESEC conferences is that within this one short week you can learn so much – about team work, about preparing for sessions, about delivery, about general conference issues (logistics, creating the atmosphere, small details) and so much more. Love it!
- It is fun and it is good network. I think the pre-meeting and the conference was one of the most fun times of my life and I made so many new good friends thanks to that. I’m very happy that the faci team was so diverse. Oh, and what a team it was – the parties and jokes we had, the great working atmosphere and team feeling I will surely never forget.
Cool stuff, eh? I wish every person once grabs an opportunity like this and outgrows-outlives-outperforms him/her self ;) MC life rocks!

I realize though that not everything at the conference went the way we wanted and for sure you can always do better, but if you truly give your best there can be no failures. John Wooden, the legendary basketball coach has written "Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming...If you sincerely try to make each day a masterpiece, angels can do no better”. That is so true!
I think the conference ended on a perfect autumn afternoon, with a great feeling and with the best song; words I’ll never forget "Don’t dream it’s over":) by Crowded House.

At the end of the day what I learned most is that no matter how things go and no matter what you might feel at a certain point of time, the feeling you get from the sugar cubes written to you and from people coming up to you, crying and saying thank you is worth every single effort you can possibly give from yourself to make a conference happen. And that is simply Wow!

Kristi

A story of a newsletter

Who would ever think that I would enjoy editing a newsletter? I guess the person who would, doesn't know me too well.. OR actually knows me better than myself. Today, I had the chance to edit the first newsletter for AIESEC in Estonia and believe it or not, it was exciting to do that- it was a true discovery of every click :)
Some people might think: "how lame is that..!"but for a person like me, who is not the "best friends" with computers, it was a small achievement on the long road of many bigger ones. I needed to overcome my perspective that it's impossible for me to ever edit a newsletter (I certainly had the view before), I was so scared of it (people are scared of things they don't know or don't feel comfortable with). Taking this all together - today is a great day for me, I got rid of one of my fears!
/mairi/

The first blogging day

Being in MC is an experience with many moments to remember. In order to record these special moments and support each other in learning, the MC team 05-06 has decided to start a blog.
Hereby I warmly welcome myself, Kaisa, Kreta, Kristi and Liisi to share our learnings and experiences throughout the year on this bolg! Happy action!