Counseling Speech 2

This is the content of my speech during the assembly on 9th of November 2010 (if not mistaken):

......Today, i have an experience to share. I think you, students, often hear teachers talking about good students and bad students. But i know students also talk about good teachers and bad teachers. So for me, am i being label as a a good teacher or a lousy teacher? I experienced both. Some students told me, “Mr.Fredy, you are a good teacher”; at the same time, you can read at the 3rd floor prep hall’s whiteboard which says “Lousy counselor, we don’t need you Freddy Chan, get lost from our school” (Although they spell my name wrongly, but i don’t think they are mentioning another person). So what is a good teacher & what is a lousy teacher? When a teacher do things in a way you like, he/she is a good teacher; when a teacher scolds you, do things the way you don’t like, then that teacher is a bad teacher, that’s what i observed.

Anyway, that’s not the main thing i wanna talk about today. What i really want to share is about emotional management. As i mentioned just now, students write something unfavorable to me. At first, i was really angry. Although i’m a counselor, i know my rights as a teaching staff and i was thinking of taking disciplinary action on those students. But i didn’t do that, because i thought that maybe i should take this opportunity to reflect on myself first. So I thought, although i did nothing wrong, but as a counselor i can use other approaches instead of scolding students. I’ve taken this opportunity to try to improve myself instead of just to taking action on students to get back my rights, or pride, to relieve my anger. Students might stop doing nonsense out of fear but did i fulfill my job as a educator? When I lose my temper and scold students or speak harshly with students, this may distant students from me, and i won’t be able to fulfill my job as a counselor, because students may not feel comfortable to share things with me when they need. More over, if i’m being emotional and ‘swallow’ their words saying, “we don’t need you”, i might give up the job, giving up on the majority students by listening to just some minority voices. These are some of my reflections.

So for you students, when your friends say bad things to you, call you names, or when your teacher scolds you; instead of getting angry and fight back, do you try to reflect on yourself, and try to improve yourself? Or you just say that person is lousy, talk back to teachers, call other names which you yourself don’t like it, or to pick a fight. By doing all that, you might relieve your anger temporarily, but does it do you any further good? Or actually it bring you more harm later, and let the negative power cycle around?

I want to dedicate my words especially to those students who are going to graduate. I hope besides being successful in your academic, and maybe sports, you’ll also learn to improve your character. Learn to reflect on yourself. You might think all your attitude is ok for you for now, or even in your college years. But in the future, when you still don’t try to learn how to reflect on yourself and change, you might bring damage to yourself. So later when you go back to the prep hall and see those words, instead of laughing at it, i hope you can think about what i’ve said. Think about it not for me, but for yourself.

Last thing before I finish my speech. Maybe you’ll hear about rumors about another person, but before you clarify, please don’t take others opinion as a fact and believe it. Even you yourself, sometimes believe in something without clarifying the whole thing. Things happened before where students fight because his friend is saying something about another person, which is not true, or not the whole truth, and turns out that students believe it and fight back with the innocent students. Maybe you don’t want to listen to me right now, but in the future when you really face some difficult situation, i hope you still can remember what i’ve said. Good luck for your exam, and good luck for your future!

Counseling Speech

This is the content of my speech during the assembly on 28th of September (if not mistaken):

......First, i would like to talk about myth and misunderstanding toward counseling. Some people will think that by seeing counselor means that that person is problematic or weak. But as a normal human being, we all will face difficulties and obstacles in our life, we will often face different issues and problem which is very common for everyone no matter who you are. Students, teachers, professors, even president of a country have their own personal issues. Nobody is perfect. But the difference is some people will choose to face their issues, but some will run away from it.

Some people will face the issues by searching or thinking of a way out themselves, or they will ask help from some others. The 'help' I'm saying here does not just refer to psychological aspects, but also things like, you'll ask help from friends, police, teacher, or a plumber to fix your pipe and so on. Human are not perfect, and it's impossible for us to know everything, and solve every problem throughout our life without any help from others, even for a counselor. Just like a doctor, he cannot do surgery by himself and must ask other doctors to help.

But for some people, they'll run away from their issues and tell themselves that "I'm OK", when actually the issues haven't been solved. sometimes when you run away from your issues, it might seem OK for a moment but it might become a big problem for you someday, or even bothering you non-stop throughout your life.

By seeking for help, by seeing a counselor shouldn't be seen as weak or problematic, but actually it shows that that person is brave enough to face his/her own problem, and want to help himself, want to improve himself to become a greater person instead of keeping on lying to himself.

According to my observation, students here like to complain about a lot of things. You'll complain about teachers, complain about staff, this teacher don't know how to teach, and want others to do things according your way. But when are you going to start complaining about yourself? Or to ask yourself, "Am i good enough? Is there anything that i can improve?". Improve not for your teacher, but for yourself. Like what I've said before, "Your life is your life", teachers will try their best to help you to become a better person, but if you yourself don't wanna improve, how can we help? If you improve, you change, that's for your own life, not for teachers.

Before i end my speech, i would life to ask you to ask yourself some question, "Am i running away from my problems? Am i trying to help myself? Is there anything i can improve for myself?". If you have anything you don't agree with me, or if you have any question, please feel free to see me at the counseling department.

The last thing i wanna say is, We teachers, would always hope that you guys are able to help yourself, but if you face difficulties and looking for someone to help, we will always be here for you.

Counseling & Me

This is actually one of my assignment during the course of my counseling program, and i think i would like to share it with others in my blog.

Here it is:

If I would like to tell about why I choose to study counseling, I will say that it is all start with an idealistic thought rather than a realistic planning. What makes me say it is because of an idealistic thought? You will know it from my story of the process I went through in selecting the counseling profession…

When I was a kid, I have a lot of fantasies. I wanted to become a professional basketball player, a kung fu master, a singer, and a lot more, and my parents give me a lot of freedom in choosing what I want to be. I think it was until Form 5, then only I started to consider what field of occupation that I really want to get into, and the answer is I wanted to become a teacher! And my ambition to be a teacher at that time is very much related to why I am studying counseling now.

Influence
As what I remember, my ambition to become a teacher is mainly influenced by , a science-fiction novel series written by Ni Kuang. Although the novel series is about the adventures of the main character, Wisely, but the stories reflect a lot of the weaknesses, and negative or evil side of mankind in making a lot of problem to human itself such as crimes, pollution, and wars. The ugly side of human is self-destructive. Because of I am a person who likes to make a lot of thinking alone, by reading these books, it makes me think of how I can help, or what can I do to solve this social phenomenon for the sake of mankind. Thus, I want to be a teacher because I think I can teach the young generation to have a good and strong will, and develop a ‘good’ personality before they are being ‘polluted’ by the darker side of the society. Moreover, I can also pass my thoughts to a lot of people by being a teacher. I believe that if I can teach them the ‘right’ things, many problems in our society can be reduced. In addition, actually I really enjoy the feelings of ‘lecturing’ people, the feeling of sharing my point of view.

Another reason of why I want to be a teacher is because I do not like to work for long hours, and to deal with a lot of paper work by just sitting inside in an office. To me, the workload for a teacher is not as much as other types of office work, and I can enjoy a lot of holidays. Although some people may think it is hard for a teacher to make a lot of money, but that’s not within my consideration, maybe because I do not have a good knowledge on financial planning. Somehow, I still think that if I want to earn more money, I can do it by giving tuition besides teaching at school.

Apart from the thought of want to be a teacher, I have a little interest on study psychology because at that time, I was thinking by understanding the thought of human, I can influence people easily to have a same way of thinking like me. In conclusion, I would say that I am the one that think about what I want to be rather than being influence by someone significant, because I really cannot think of anyone who influences me in thinking in such way.

Significant Event
But things have changed somehow. After I have finished my pre-university study, I was required to choose courses that I would like to study in varsity. At that time, the courses that appeared in my mind was education and psychology. But when I looked at the choices, I saw a course called “counseling” offered by University of Malaya, which is the university that I wanted to get into. Since UM is my dream university, plus the word “counseling” made me think that it is a combination of education and psychology, thus I made this course as my first choice. This is a significant event which connects me to counseling. If according to my ambition at the time, I should have listed educational courses as my first choice. But because I did not want to think too much, nor make a lot of research on the course, I chose counseling.

Realization
A few months later, I successfully got myself into UM after an interview, and started my study on “counseling”. After a series of classes, I started to know more about the counseling profession, and also started to realize that I cannot become a teacher by taking this course. At first, a small part of my mind telling me that I had choose a wrong course to study; but another part of my mind is telling me that, actually I can also reshape the society by helping adults besides helping the young generation by studying counseling! And because of some reasons such as the difficulty and time consuming on changing course, and also the content of the course is deeply interest me, I decided to continue my study on it.

From time to time in my study of counseling, my understanding about it has improved a lot than before, and some of my perception has also changed. I realized that actually my thought of changing the society is very objective and not very realistic. I think it is not very realistic is because it is almost impossible to change everyone to have a same perception like me since everybody have different cultural background and may influenced by a lot of things in their own life. On the other hand, I’m thinking that it is more important to help others to live a happy life, and if everyone in this world is living happily, the world can also become more beautiful as the way I hope for! Helping as much people as I can is also more realistic than changing every people in this world. Moreover, I have also realize that one of the best things in this world is helping people to get what they want, but not making people to accept what we want.

Somewhere along my study in counseling, I also realized that the thought of want to change others is not only objective and unrealistic; it is also kind of irrational and can be devilish. Every individual have his or her own unique personality and worldview, and it is impossible to make people think the same as I am. In additional, I think my perception about the changing others is very objective because what I think is right maybe is wrong to the other, and there’s no absolute answer for a lot of things in this world. If I insist to make everyone think the same way as I am, then maybe I will ignore others right, and the real happiness that others seek for. Moreover, we maybe cannot see the uniqueness personalities in the mankind that makes the world so colorful if everyone just thinks like me.

Counseling And Me
Apart from what I have mentioned above, actually by studying counseling also allowed me to know myself better, and helps me solve some of my personal issues such as my personality problem. For example, I am an impatient, hot-tempered person, and after I’ve started studying counseling, I try to change into a better person by applying what I’ve learnt. Having patience is also actually one of the basic criteria to be a good counselor. I have come to understand in order to help others, one must first know how to help oneself. All this while, I label myself as a problematic person, and it makes me think that I can empathize others easier because I have been through a lot.

The counseling profession actually requires a lot of talking, which is not so different from teaching. And it turns out to be almost the same as what I wished for to be a teacher. Like what I have mentioned before, I like the job that needs to talk a lot rather than the job that need to do a lot of paper work. Counseling has similarities with lecturing but it comes in a different form in which it actually requires more listening and questioning. It requires more professional skill to do so, and it is a skill that I’m constantly trying to improve. Besides all that, I will feel very happy and successful when helping others, and I do not think of want to change the world so much anymore, but just help as much people as I can. Surprisingly, the more I study about counseling, the more I think I am suitable for this profession.

Throughout my study in counseling, counseling has now become a big part in my life in which I dream to be a successful counselor. Although I am become more mature than before and have a more realistic ambition, but actually the idealistic part of want to influence others still stays in some part of my mind. I still have the hope that I can influence every human to care more about each other and also our mother earth, to makes our world become more beautiful than before.

*P/S: My english is not that good, it was edited by my girlfriend :P