Youth Xchange: Volunteers' Stories - Natasha Samuels
Natasha shares a very personal reflection on what the GX journey has meant for her.
My significant change is a story of self-awareness. ‘Finding yourself’ on a trip like this is such a cliché and probably the sort of thing expected in a significant change story. At 23, now 24, I already had an idea of what I wanted out of life to some extent so ‘finding myself’ wasn’t going to be something I did on this trip, and to be honest, I’m not really keen on the concept anyway. Nevertheless, what I have done is become more aware of myself – my strengths, my weaknesses, my abilities and confirmed my direction in life.
Firstly, I found Maggi’s enneagram sessions in Glasgow quite empowering and through these and talking with her one-one-one I found out that I was a number ‘9’. At first I was a little sceptical of the concept that every person, as unique as we are, can fit into 9 personality types and I thought perhaps I may see myself in a number of the types. However, on reading the personality traits of a number 9 it was like reading a paragraph written about me. Through the enneagram I have found a sense of relief and peace in myself. Things that have always annoyed myself about me, such as my indecisiveness and tendency to procrastinate, are part of who I am and this knowledge can help me solve these problems by working with and not against them. Being a number 9 also has it’s positives, such as my ability to see both sides of an argument or problem or event means that I am diplomatic and I think within this team environment have really been able to develop this strength which I am grateful for and will be able to take on and develop in future jobs and roles.
One thing I realised about myself before GX is that I was never really very opinionated or passionate about anything, except maybe travelling. I knew I wanted to work in International Development but lacked direction. Since being on GX, for some reason, I have become passionate and opinionated about equality and justice – such as Gender equality. I am happy to have found a passion for something else and a bit more direction and focus. I have realised the importance of young people for change and want to continue working with engaging young people in international development and global issues. Additionally, I have become more aware of my strengths and weaknesses. At YCSA our work involved going into schools to work with kids who have either self-esteem or behavioural issues. I saw myself as a child in some of the children with low self-esteem.
When I was a child at school I was painfully shy and I told my colleagues at YCSA that had this sort of programme been around at my school in my time I would have definitely been put forward for it. As I grew up I got less and less shy, I challenged myself at University and stepped out of my comfort zone and did things such as hitchhiking across Europe, which improved my confidence no end and then I went on to do things such as Platform2 and now GX.
However, GX has made me aware that even though I have already come a long way from that shy little girl, I still have a long way to go and still lack faith and confidence in myself. I still feel that I am innately a shy person, but I want to overcome it. As Peppy said to me, I need to rewrite the story I am telling myself and stop telling myself I am a shy person. As I have already come so far, I need to continue to push myself in this area and create new habits. It is in situations with strangers that I find most difficult, so I need to listen to what one of my lovely Chinese team members told me and not worry, because people don’t know me – I will tell myself this every time I feel this way.
I also want to thank all of you for helping me become a bit more confident in my abilities, through receiving positive comments from you guys and the lovely messages on my birthday. So I think my significant change is that I am more confident in myself and my abilities but I still have to work on my self-confidence.
