My Lesson of 2010: Facing Failure.

Dear public diary, as 2010 is coming to a close, I start to think more about the lessons I`ve gained this year. This is sort of a wrap-up of the first six months of this year, and my experience of going through them. If you think it`s a very long blog post, you are right.

The biggest lesson for me has to be in facing failure, since a bit more than half of this year I faced one failure after the other, and in things that really matter to me, and decide the rest of my life.

I remember how I started 2010. I stepped into the new year together with Lavinia, then I spent 3-6 January in the AIESEC Iasi office, from morning till night, together with Ionica (he was running MCVP TM AIESEC Romania).

We were all alone, drinking coffee on his money (as usual) and filling in application forms, making strategies, I was calling 12 Incoming Exchange vice presidents from all over the country, everything you would normally do when running for a national position in AIESEC Romania.

Ever since my first national conference in 2007 the dream of being part of AIESEC Romania national team started in my mind. The idea of bringing ICX in Romania to a new level, working in a dedicated and professional space, serving 13 Local Committees, they all sounded very awesome and like things I would remember forever.

Then the 3 day national conference came, my first national application, presenting my strategy and vision in front of the leadership body of Romania (about 80 people). I remember that night in Bucharest, where the final announcements we`re made. We we`re sitting on the stairs of a restaurant, it was 2 a.m. a lot of people from back home sent me text messages with encouragements. My heart pumping and racing with excitement, fear,  and other intense feelings that came over me as I was waiting to hear the results.

Then looking into Laura`s eyes (new MCP), as she was announcing the results and saying Reka Ujfalvi is the new MCVP ICX.

It hurt, and in that moment, I felt like I was disappointing the people that believed in me; my ICX team back home, my family whom I had so many big fights about AIESEC with, yet supported me with heroism, my EB team to whom I always said there is no option of me not making MCVP ICX Romania, my girlfriend back them, everyone.

The only thing that honestly make it easier, was my respect for Reka, who is an amazing person and AIESECer, and is doing a great job, and my deep respect for Laura, and my belief in her ability to choose the most suitable people for Romania.

After all this you get to go home, look at everyone around you, smile and say it`s ok, it`s ok.  You feel like a stranger for a while, but I knew one thing, which was that I belonged in AIESEC.

A few weeks later I gathered the courage to make another leap of faith and apply for AIESEC Norway. To this moment, I worked for that national application more than any other application, one full week. I talked with Rolf (MCP), Roxi (Romanian MCVP X), everyone knew I was running and they we`re supporting me. I started dreaming about 1 year in Oslo, things we`re looking up. Here is the Movie I used in that application (and in the application for Romania earlier on):

I got the call that I`m not selected while I was participating in a Web Design competition with Bogdan Rusu and Dan. That was again hard. Yet this time it felt a bit easier than before.

[...]

Three months had passed since 2010 started, and I still had no idea what I`m going to do. All I knew was that I will reach the biggest AIESEC Conference, IC India in August, and that I will be part of a national team no matter what.

I had applied in AIESEC Denmark national team, but withdrew my application in the middle of it all because I just did not connect to anyone there, and did not feel it was my place in Copenhagen. This was also the last time I announced on Facebook I`m running for a MC. I remember one of the people in my list commenting ” Dude, don`t you think it`s time you give up and do something else?”  Good question.

But I was decided, I will not give up, no matter what, there is no other way, I have a lot to learn and to give to AIESEC.

I was already feeling like a stranger in AIESEC Iasi. Back in the middle of April, 2 3 weeks after finishing my LCVP ICX term, I decided to apply for the position of LCP for AIESEC Suceava, a new expansion LC AIESEC Iasi was running from the ground up. I was not selected by my former teammate, Negurici, and his new EB team, half of which I coached and help develop during the last years. Ionica took the “No” harder than I did, he was, even months later, very upset about them not selecting me. But I recovered soon, I guess so because I didn`t feel strong enough about that application. I didn`t even spend more than 2 hours on writing it. It just felt like something I was just doing. Even my presentation was mediocre, and I knew it. The lesson here? Don`t do things if you don`t believe in them.

AIESEC Iasi had been my home, my family for 2 and a half years but it no longer needed me, no longer wanted me, I didn`t even see me fit to lead a smaller local committee. I finished my term in Iasi, I was not LCP Suceava, which meant I had to leave and let the new generation grow, I had nothing to look back in AIESEC over there. Or at least that was how I felt at the time.

After that, the first good thing that happened in 2010 was when Mary, LCP Sevastapol from Ukraine selected me to be part of the Leadership facilitators team for the conference New Horizons (you can find that experience in a different post around here).

Because of that I ended up spending my whole month of May coaching AIESEC Chisinau working on all departments in Moldova, working with amazing AIESEC members and chairing a conference, visited Ukraine twice, first time in Mariupol delivering my best AIESEC conference so far, and then 7 days in Odessa, working with Anna Soloid (the best LCP i ever worked with). These experiences we`re just amazing, and I consider myself really fortunate to have had them and meet you guys, so Thank you!

At the same time, while I was in Ukraine for the first time, I was applying for the national team of AIESEC Ireland, where Vlad Fejer was MCP, a man that has always been a role-model for me. This time not getting selected was pretty OK, since Alecu, the dude that actually got selected instead of me for the position I was running for had a lot more experience and results in the field he was applying, and I kind of knew he was going to get it. I`m not saying I wasn`t sad or anything, my mother was moving to Dublin and I would have liked to support her in her new life, but I guess Ukraine and experience in failing so far already meant it wasn`t that hard.

Also while in Ukraine for the first time, delivering the conference, I managed to find the time and the coffee to write an application for MCVP Projects AIESEC New Zealand.  I had some good friends in New Zealand whom encouraged me to apply, and helped me through the process. Here`s the application video shot at 6 in the morning:

I was so tired that I didn`t even realize I was holding the camera wrong )

Ahhhhh, I was so young and bloody tired ))). Looking back at the video, I remember wishing to get involved in an environment where Growth, and Personal Development and Achievement is something on the daily agenda, to be part of a team who wants to challenge themselves, grow, and live in an international environment day by day. Back then I was hoping to be part of it, today I am privileged to lead it.

I was delivering a Business Simulation in AIESEC Chisinau, Moldova, when I received my e-mail from New Zealand. It was 2 days late, 2 days in which It was horribly hard to sleep. I had no internet at home, and every night for the past week I was dreaming of being in Auckland, then dreaming of failing and not getting selected, waking up in the middle of the night sweating, and running in the morning to the office (had no internet at home).

Being rejected in New Zealand hit me pretty hard. I was in the middle of the training, and I managed to hide my feelings until the end of it. It was already close to June, and almost all the MC teams in the network we`re already formed and bonding. I had been through a total of 5 MC applications so far, and 1 LCP application, and while most people stop after the first or Maybe second one, I still had not found my place.

In that time I also had some discussions with the MCPs of Moldova and Ukraine, for the possibility of joining their teams on the positions they still had unfilled, on Sales in MD and Local Committee Development in UA. Didn`t happen.

These conversations bring the total number of MCs I applied for or discussed about to 7 by that point.

Now Manu, my former LCP, was asking me if I have any future plans besides AIESEC, and my father was trying to get me involved in his small business, also as an “exit” strategy. I guess for most normal people it would be time to “Get the message”.

I remember my month of June, back in Romania. I had some exams, they provided as good distractions.

It`s funny how the world works.

By that time, I had failed 7 times in finding my place.

I don`t know what would have happened if I didn`t have people around me to believe in me, encourage me when I was down, and help me get back up. Finally, in Moldova, I was living with Arteom, a Ukranian LCP from Donetsk, who applied for MCP Ukraine and didn`t get it. It was from him that I first heard of the opening of MCP Azerbaijan, the last MCP position in the network still open. The last position open in 110 countries, if you can imagine that ).

Time to pick myself up from the floor one more time, give my best and hope I`m the right person for it.

The processes for running MCP was pretty simple compared to other countries, since Azerbaijan was 4 years old and didn`t have time to develop it`s system to a very complex level.

I worked about 5 days non-stop on my application, I put my heart into it, again, even though I had failed so many times in the past 6 months. To make it even better, and the other guy who was applying MCP joined AIESEC 2 years before me, plus had an LCP and MCVP position in those two years that I did not have.

You would think that applying for so many positions would make it feel less intense while waiting for the answer, but it isn`t. I still felt like on the stairs in Bucharest back in January, looking into Laura`s eyes. 6 days later than they we`re supposed to announce the results, in early July,

I got selected.

I just started screaming like crazy and I remember Dana calling me from Bucharest and crying over the phone (she got selected in January for MCVP Comm Romania, and she always felt guilty that she went there while me and Ionica got left behind).

I finally reached the finish line, the 6 month gauntlet of facing failure after failure brought me to this moment where I was taking the mantle of Leadership for AIESEC in Azerbaijan. Amazing moment, it somehow erased everything and got me excited about AIESEC and my journey within it.

Today, 25th November, we just had final interviews for some amazing new members in AIESEC Azerbaijan, some of them getting ready to finish the induction period and run for VPs soon. We also just raised 7 TT internships with Bakcell, which is a huge accomplishment for us. I am proud of Mihai and Crina, my national team, who even though had to through really really hard weeks, both professionally and personally, push for achieving more every day, proud of the first real generation of AIESEC Azerbaijan local members, who are about to run for Leadership (we are finishing the Job Descriptions for LCP and LCVPs Tonight!!!), proud of me, and how far I pushed myself to come.

This Chrismass is going to be hard, since I`m not going to make it home to my family, like every year since I was born. I will be in a far away land, surrounded by people whom don`t celebrate this hollyday, thinking of my mother, father, grandmother and friends.

But somehow, I know I will be ok, because the work I`m doing here has meaning, has purpose, is worth it.

A few days ago, a person I started caring about asked me how can I not be afraid of failure.

I think I will always be afraid of failure, it`s part of being human for me.

But I can thank 2010 for showing me that life for me is not about winning or failing, but about following your heart, believing in yourself and getting ready for one heck of a journey.

If you actually read this far, chances are you are one of the people whom helped me along my path, so from the bottom of my heart,

Multumesc, Thank you, Spasiba, Çox Sağ ol.

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