Meet, Appreciate and Grow

    - Lin Lei （TEAM Participant）

Five years ago I still remembered the warmth from the handshake with Dr. Choi. A person, who still cared for a stranger like me, was greatly admired by others. So many friends who joined TEAM (Training of Excellent Adolescent Mentors) shared the common goal of helping the next generation to overcome life obstacles. I knew this was my vocation not only by having belongingness with so much gain in TEAM, but also the clear mission and values.

TEAM was actually a journey of understanding with experiencing, meeting, connecting and sharing. To youth workers like us, experiencing a long-term and steady relationship was very important. Even in the beginning of such relationship, people would not talk openheartedly. However, when the camp was close to the end, almost everyone knew each other well with openness, trust, and hope. Such friendship first needed our self acquaintance, self awareness, self acceptance, and self development. Then we could connect, understand, help, and walk with each other.

My Journey of Self Understanding. During the first part of TEAM activities, I discovered that I got so anxious easily for my partner’s slowness, others’ superficial sharing and team alienation. Nevertheless when I quietly looked at myself and my own experience with others, I clearly thought that TEAM looked like the youth. When serving them, we had the exploration and adaptation period, and then the harmonization and growth period. When everyone was being respected and accepted, I discovered that I did not need to be anxious and I could see the strength of my partners. Also from this first part of learning, I had even touched on my biggest lesson – the fear of death. How could I calmly face life and death? How could I have a meaningful life? At least now I had courage to face and direction to move forward.

My Journey of Understanding My Partners. Youth worker was the general name of our profession. However, in TEAM, everyone had his or her own uniqueness. I never forgot our challenges and our teamwork. Our last team activity had shown the team power from all members from which we had gained our trust and pride. Moreover we could felt the tender care from the working staff whose service could have deep influence to everyone.

My Journey of Understanding Youth. When we were meeting the youth, how could we understand them, discover their strength, and help them to grow? How could we help those families living closely and harmoniously, and becoming the youth’s refuge in time of needs? This would be a long journey in which I would expect, in TEAM, we could be well-equipped and we could walk confidently. I hope everyone could excel, like the little flowers, which we have found in the activity of “Words in Life”, blossoming out beautifully.