Firstly, I would like to
commend the AAA Namibia team, for doing an impeccable job of bringing young people
together. The first time I had contact with the team, they had approached me
via email to feature me on their videos (check them out on YouTube - AAA Trailblazers) as they believed there are plenty of
Namibians out there who need a voice and can inspire the youth. What struck me
about the team wasn’t just the professional manner in approach, or team effort
but the vision they had. To have a genuinely passion and need to impact the youth.
Secondly, I would like to
commend the Jan Mohr team, for agreeing to have this event hosted at their
school, not only allowing learners to have a voice and start their public
speaking journey, but to allow the youth to come together and have thought
provoking conversations. I do not take moments like these for granted, as it is
in them that we meet people, learn a lesson and go home changed.
Lastly, you the audience,
that could have chosen to be anywhere tonight, but chose to attend this night of inspirational
talks. To support your fellow students, your brothers and sisters or friends.
With that I say good
evening ladies and gentlemen, my name is Mavis Braga Elias, a civil engineering
student, who not too long ago finished my matric and ventured into the world.
It is after which I joined energy100fm, a local radio station and for whom I
have been working for 4 years now. Additionally, I founded a Charity
organization called Love is Charity that looks to cater to the less fortunate.
I later started up a Events company called Ehaveco Events with my fellow
business partners Martha Nangolo and Eva Fritz. I too recently was appointed as
Director of the One Economy Foundation alongside the First Lady of the country,
Madame Monica Geingos. I am 23 years old and I do not share this with you
tonight to have you in awe, but rather to motivate you in achieving your dreams
and ambitions. In all honesty, when they said I am to be the keynote speaker
here tonight, I somewhat felt out of my depth . I am used to taking center stage and hosting events, or behind a mic where no one can see me. However,
there is one thing I do have that I bring with me there tonight and that is a
passion for young people. Being young myself I have much to learn, however
there are key lessons I can share that I have learnt along my journey.
There are various lessons
that I can share with you, but there is one thing that has stayed with me,
which was derived from a conversation I had with my father to which he told me,
Mavis – You need to become obsessed with what will make you successful and not
become obsessed with success. Why this particularly struck me has little to do
with not having known that in life the one thing that can drive you is ambition
and passion, but more to do with the fact that we have now come to a time and
age where our decisions are impacted by a need for money. Although money is for
survival, it cannot become the one thing that we have at the forefront when we
speak of attaining our dreams and ambitions.
Let me share a story
with you. When I was young and growing up, well I am young, but I mean when I
was younger, I worked relentlessly at school and academics. I had an excellent
work ethic, but I lacked the one thing that anyone needs to make it in life.
Integrity, my father defines it as what you do when no one is watching. I had a
great sense of potential but significantly failed to harness it. I was
intelligent, but I couldn’t quiet focus the intelligence to grant anything
meaningful. I was so wrapped up in being popular and trying at all costs to
ensure that I was feared at school, which looking back today I can honestly say, was the dumbest decision I have ever made. Not only did it have me walk out of
high school with a poor resume, it costed me in more ways then one. I could
easily have secured scholarship or bursaries to go study abroad, but my resume
wouldn’t allow. A resume is a testimonial that your teachers write upon you
completing your high school. Mine, looked terrible. I later was able to look
back on my high school career and wished I had made better choices, and I can
say that if someone had been there to guide me and coerce me into making better
decisions I may have done better. Although, I failed to see the people
that did try. I had a teacher named Mrs. Tamsen who made it her life goal to
check on my every single day at school. I for one, couldn’t comprehend why she
constantly was so bothered to check if my school uniform was worn correctly,
hair tied back as is stipulated in the rule book. I was adamant to be anything
but behaved at school, at whose cost? Although, I didn’t know that then, I know
today that it was to my detriment.
High School plays such a
significant role in shaping your future that we take for granted how
significantly. It is in high school that you shape your character, as
University will come with its own set of tests and if anything, you need to be
stern and firm in who you are as a person to ensure that no level of peer
pressure will have you cave and lose yourself. I didn’t fully understand that
when I was in high school, because I believed that I would mold and better
myself in university, not knowing that, that could go incredibly wrong.
I tell you these things, because if there was a time travelling machine I would go back to tell myself
the very things I am telling you today. I was privileged enough to have found
friends who I can honestly say played a vasts role in who I have grown up to be
and who I am going to become. I am lucky. Not all of us get as lucky.
Now, if I could go back
to find Mavis from 5 years back I would tell her the following;
- Be careful who you call a friend, because when they say birds of a feather flock together, they mean that your feathers will soon look like their feathers. We can try excuse it and claim that we want to be better influences to our friends and can perhaps help them become better people, although noble. You are at a far too fragile age in your life to be wanting to help better people. You are at a stage in your life where you are allowed to be as selfish as you need to be in your self-preservation and growth. You are to choose you at any juncture, because the time for sacrifices will come.
- Give your education everything you have. Ensure that you out perform yourself and never settle for mediocre. There is greatness in you, you just need to tap into it and go looking for it. Ensure that your academics take the fore front in all that you do. Learn. Learn all that you need to, absorb the information and build your IQ. Polish your language and let go of the slang. Ensure that when you walk into a room and start speaking, people stop to listen. Not because you are saying something particularly useful, but because you command attention with your manner of speaking.
- Drop the defense mechanisms and learn yourself. Understand who you are thoroughly, from the places of weakness to strengths. Learn your strengths so that you may polish them and use them to your advantage, because in your strengths lies your potential and passions. It is in your strengths that you will find career choices, it is in your strengths that you will learn who you are. In the same light, embrace your weaknesses. Acknowledge the areas in which you are weak, because by acknowledging them, you can work on them. You will be able to decipher how to combat the areas of weakness. If you don’t know your weaknesses, they are left untested. This can be particularly detriment, as they could catch you off guard. Teach yourself about yourself, lean to understand yourself, because in doing so, you will know what you will stand for and what you will fall for. They say, if you do not know what you stand for, you will fall for anything.
- Read. Teach yourself about the world, because if you know the world, it is at your fingertips. With knowledge comes power. The more you know, the bigger your advantage to your opponent. Pick up a newspaper and educate yourself about the world, read plenty of books because in them you’ll discover writing skills and passions. When you know a lot more, you make better decisions. It broadens your way of thinking. It expands your horizon.
- Vision cast. Do not leave it to later, hoping that life will pan out as it supposed to.
Thank you.
