She is only 23 years of age. Beautiful. Intelligent. One of the glistening junior facilitator in Tempo Institute.
“I am not a confident person.” How come?
Not sure why, but Alya grew up feeling far from being pretty. That is why she tried to “drown” herself socially. “I deliberately hang out with boys, because whenever I hang out with girls, they always made comments on my outfits, my unsexy body, my flat chest.”
After graduated from Social and Politic Faculty of UGM in April 2017, Alya started her first job as a marketing staff at a cosmetic company. The confidence issue was worsened. “I wore heavy make-up. One bottle of make-up was finished before a month.”
This unconfident fungus has gotten fertilized. Absurd comments from colleagues were often heard. “Al, don’t wear this outfit in the future. It’s ugly.” Or, “When we go out on the weekend, don’t forget to dress up, so you don’t look like a tramp.”
Wow, quite a toxic environment, right? “Maybe they were not actually toxic. At that time, I felt this was a normal demand, given the fact it was a cosmetic company. Now I realized, that was actually sad and rude. I felt like the ugly duckling.”
Alya then decided to take on another job and joined Tempo Institute. Within months, Alya learned so fast on how to facilitate a training, handling the participants, and how to lit up the class’ mood. “It was very challenging. I was forced to be confident.”
The feeling of confidence blossomed at Tempo Institute. “This Ugly Duckling was given a responsibilities. Moderated a discussion, became an MC in front of the Minister of Communication and Information, Rudiantara.
“A girl just wanna be trusted.” Trust from others, superiors, surroundings, are amazing reinforcements. Like getting incentive power. Learning many new things. Staying up late to prepare the facilitating technique was never an issue. “If the class was successful, all the participants were happy, I am happy.”
Her university friends observed her transformation too. “They commented, Al, you look better and glowing now. Back then, even though you put heavy make-up, you looked tired and gloomy.”
Aha. ⠀
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