Loosing in the fellowship:A lesson learnt

The three months long intensive Amal journey comes to an end. To briefly go over what exactly the Amal fellowship looks like, here is a quick review of it. Founded by Sir Benje Williams, the 3- months Stanford University funded programme focuses on developing professional skills needed for a successful career and life.

Starting from my first day, I can still recall how reluctant I was to head out for the programme. The first few weeks were difficult and were nearly dreaded because I was the shy type- introvert person who really had difficulty approaching fellows and talking to them. But some moments stood by and that helped me to dive in the journey making it a bit of a success.

By far, I can remember the four basic principles taught to us in the journey which were the following:

1. AMAL

2. Khudi

3. Aik aur Aik gyara

4. Kaam, Kaam aur Kaam

Retaining to that I believe that I wasn’t really aware to the principles early in my life before. May be somewhere in my life I have had the chance to act on these foundation but only did I realize it after coming to Amal. The three months journey taught me a great deal through these principles. Amal fellowship was not just based on these principles but there was more to it.

The basic question arises of:

The most important lesson that I learned in the journey?

A hard question that really made me put my thinking cap on. I entered the journey to learn something new. Something that may not be a part of my life before. As a undergraduate, I believe that half of the things were done. But the other half really made go an extra mile to do tasks that I did not learn or heard about them else where.

The most important thing that I felt in this journey was the listening part. The integral part of the fellowship that I emphasize upon to make this journey a more success. I believe it was very important to hear every person’s point of view and and especially listening from every fellow failure stories. Since, every person I strongly believe is not perfect so the ups and downs of life are something that one should lend an ear to. I believe all my fellows had great examples of success by overcoming the failures that they had once faced in their life.

Importance of it?

The question arises is how much importance it holds for me. Certainly it does as I was there to enhance my life long journey. Listening to the success and failure stories really turned on my way of thinking.

I can particularly relate it to the examples of the fellowship program when in class we were made to sit in a circle and we had to discuss our “embracing the pain” stories. Every person in the group had some great stories to share that having a strong message behind it.

The other one I remember when we were paired in a group of two and had to share our “Strength stories”, that we had written it as a part of our assignment. I remember I quickly figured out on all my strengths but when the time came to discuss the “Weakness Stories”, I was easily able to identify many but was not able to relate it to any story.

Apart from just developing the ability of speaking and discussing things, listening naturally felt important to me because it instills a a lot of patience in us and thus sometimes gives us a chance to overcome our major mistakes.

I remember the last session where we were made to sit in a circle and had to “apply our leadership skills” and be the first one to take the lead. It was an interesting activity that involved listening and speaking at the same time. Our both batch fellows has some wonderful stories to share where they had acted as a leader, natural or as the chosen one.

The listening part contributes while overlooking through personal experiences. May be to develop or identify a change in the personality, intent listening is important.

Taking it beyond Amal fellowship?

Quickly swiping the Amal journey which held real importance in my life where I professionally grew up to learning some great new skills. The great learning experience was there that I think that I have not had before ever in my life. I believe if I say that listening was of utmost importance to me, doesn’t necessarily count on only on the listening part but it gave way to meeting other strong communication methods and goals. Applying it beyond fellowship it has already geared my life a bit where I believe the I can nourish the abilities for my up coming practical life. I can be a content, good and an eager listener who can go on easy on her listening skills. Easy listening and easy doing will be something reserved for my practical approach.

I did like to end it on a beautiful note:

“Listen with curiosity. Speak with honesty. Act with integrity. The greatest problem with communication is we don’t listen to understand. We listen to reply. When we listen with curiosity, we don’t listen with the intent to reply. We listen for what’s behind the words.”
― Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart