Arriving, departing, coming to be

We have arrived.  I have never been more shocked at the present than I am excited for the future – and I’m quite excited for the future.  As I sat in the "senior goodbye circle" during the last Sursum Corda Service Organization meeting, I was humbled by how phenomenal we had become in four years; how transformative our Jesuit and Marymount education has been. 

I’m sometimes tempted by the inaccurate sentiment that having “arrived” and developed so much at LMU means that we are “done,” that because we have learned all we needed to learn, we will necessarily make better decisions for the world; decisions that prompt inclusion, justice and solidarity.  But then I hear myself and other seniors repeat the most cliché things that we have supposedly already learned.  Clearly, we are not “done.”  There’s a reason clichés are clichés.  I’ve come to recognize that even the ideal state of being that we may have “arrived to” requires constant fueling.  Even if we were to arrive at a hypothetical world peace, it wouldn’t mean that we get to take an indefinite nap.  It would mean that we can celebrate, and then continue to work to maintain it.  As soon as we lose our focus, we begin to lose what we worked for.  As soon as we forget to fuel the fire ignited in us, we begin to lose the phenomenal parts of ourselves that we worked so hard to cultivate in the last four years.  I have no doubt that many of us have arrived and are at the peak of our youthful idealism that is so valuable and necessary. Now, it’s a matter of finding life-giving ways to fuel that fire beyond the bluff so we can turn our idealism into reality.

As I depart, one of the things I am proud to take with me is my own internal measure for success.  School has a way of making things simple for us; we know how we’re doing by the grades, the annual awards ceremonies and the figurative and literal pats on the back.  Yet I am confident that I can still make sense of the world without the routine “report card” drills and measures of success that school has provided us with.  In place of transcripts and plaques, I’ll know how well I’m doing by how fully present I am in my service, how congruent I am with my idealistic philosophy, how authentic I am in my endeavors, how willing I am to put my reputation on the line by speaking up for something others consider petty, how hard I work to find God in all things, how well I give “care of the whole person” to others, how humble I am in my intellectual endeavors and how conscious I am about inviting those on the margins to sit at the table as equals.  We won’t have the safety of transcripts and awards anymore, but we’ll depart with a much more meaningful evaluation system guided by the Jesuit and Marymount tradition. 

 
I had a peculiar moment of metaphysical curiosity when I stood at an Asian-American political event last month, wondering if I would be in that same spot had I accepted USC’s admissions offer in a parallel universe.  I decided that it was possible, but I wouldn’t be thinking the same things, I wouldn’t be there for the same reasons and I wouldn’t have the same perspective.  Trippy, isn’t it?  I’ve been trying to find the words to capture the distinct perspective I’ve developed here.  Perhaps our speaker at the LMU Asian Pacific American graduation celebration said it best.  A community leader, lawyer and graduate of Loyola High School, Michael Balaoing said, “An optimist sees the glass half-full, while a pessimist sees it half-empty. But an LMU graduate doesn't care; they just want to give the glass to someone who is thirsty." 

I think Balaoing was referring to where we choose to place our focus.  Is it in the petty miseries we concern ourselves with when we fail?  Or can we rise above our ego, get up and concern ourselves with getting that glass of water to the thirsty?  In a few months, I will pack for King’s College London to pursue a graduate degree in Human Values and Contemporary Global Ethics as a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholar.  It is quite the honor, and I can only pray for the abilities to match the opportunities.  Whenever I start to worry about failing to meet expectations, I refocus and refuel by reminding myself that it’s not about me and my potential for failure.  It’s about having the honor of participating in building “the tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work,” and giving ourselves wholly with the cool passion, resilience and focus that the world deserves from us.   
 

This is the opinion of Cynthia Salim, a political science major from Lakewood, Calif. Please send comments to jmartinez@theloyolan.com