What are You Doing Here? (Pre-U Seminar 2010)
June 8th, 2010 at 5:13 pm (Home)
This was the question I had left the audience to ponder at this year’s Pre-U Seminar 2010. I was honoured to have been invited as panellist alongside the Director of Institute of Policy Studies and former Secretary-General of ASEAN, Ambassador Ong Keng Yong; and Project Director at MOE and ex-CEO of SINDA, Mr Manogaran Suppiah. The panel was chaired by the ever affable Chairman of the Public Transport Council and National Kidney Foundation, Mr Gerard Ee.
With One People – Living the Pledge as the theme, we were tasked with exploring how Singaporeans in general, and young Singaporeans in particular, could “achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation”. Having recently completed the Sahara Race – a multi day 250km footrace in the Sahara desert – I found it a fitting metaphor for life.
One can fake his way through a 10km run or put his head down and persevere through the pain barrier of a standard marathon, but a multi day run is a different kind of beast altogether. Once done with the gruelling endeavours of the first day, you have to get up the next day and do it all over again, and do it within the cut-off time. This means that you can neither afford to take your time nor can you over push yourself. Each day is about growing stronger and stronger to tackle the demands of the next.
And how do people fare in this multi day endurance race called life?
Having had the privilege of meeting and working with different cultures and people around the world and experienced the magnificent camaraderie of the Sahara Race, I think there are generally two groups of people in this world. The first are those who do not enjoy what they do, simply going through their lives just getting on with it and getting by. They derive no great pleasure from what they do and survive it rather than thrive, and wait for the weekend or the holidays to come. But there are also people who love what they do and couldn’t imagine doing anything else. They start the day with a relish because they get to do what they love and work doesn’t seem like work to them. Because it isn’t so much what they do, it’s who they are. Life is exciting and they thrive.
Which group do you belong to?
Mars Wong said,
June 10, 2010 at 12:41 pm
Hi Mr Thaddeus Lawrence,
I was greatly inspired by what you said during the panel discussions at the Pre-U Seminar 2010. Once I got home after the closing ceremony, I immediately Googled your name and I was led to this web page. Regarding the question you left us with that day, I would like to tell you that I was there spending 5 days of my June holidays learning as much as I could. (Where my peers are having fun at chalets, chilling out at Sentosa and all that sort of stuffs teenagers do). I strongly believe that learning in the classroom alone does not really do much to build our character and perspectives in life. It is all about reaching out and doing extraordinary things like you did. It is all about real-life experiences and putting ourselves in others’ shoes. I think I belong to the group of people who work hard to derive joy in everything I do. It is impossible to love everything we do, (Honestly, I don’t love to study although I chose the JC-route) but it is important to derive that simplest joy from the things we do. I enjoy the process of studying (learning) because I am always hungry for knowledge. I am very curious about things, this is one of the reasons why I ended up in the Pre-U Seminar. All in all, I agree that life can be a great adventure or nothing to different people. It is all about perspectives. Once you got your perspectives right, your life will be exciting and you will thrive. Once again, you are very inspiring and please keep it on and continue to inspire many more young minds.
Best Regards,
Mars Wong
rongrong chen said,
June 11, 2010 at 6:02 am
I personally loved this post because it struck a note deep inside, it was almost like yesterday that i was in class hearing you pep the class up for a energetic and positive day in Nanyang.
needless to say, i’ve pursued my passions and picked enough courage to do what i thought was impossible. keep up your good work, mr lawrence!
rongrong