Fighting For
Tuesday 03 March 2015
On Sunday, I caught up with the twelve children who form the ICM Children’s Choir in the Philippines. I’ve worked with these kids for the past five years and they are the most humbling-ly beautiful, generous and wonderful people that I know.
We are preparing for a show later in the year, and as part of it, Gretchen will share some parts of her life-story. She’s now 17, but when I met her she was twelve, shy, often late to or absent from choir practice, hardly spoke English, and sang so quietly I hardly knew she had a voice. What she has been through in her life amazes me; growing up without parents, in a dark, opportunity-stealing, dangerous part of the city, surviving on a tiny income, with her older sister pregnant at 15, knowing that she was unwanted.
As I sat talking to this precious girl, she asked me “How did I get here? I’m about to graduate high school and go to the best college in the city. I have travelled to Hong Kong and the USA. I get to perform to so many people... how did I get here?”
Gretchen is a deep thinker. She has a beautiful voice. She has a beautiful, generous and thoughtful spirit. She cares deeply for others. But the thing that amazes me the most about her is the purpose that she now carries. The conviction she has that she is here for a reason; it brings tears to my eyes, even now as I type. She is so determined to make her life mean something. She wants to study psychology and help counsel and guide people who have been through trauma in life. She says that no-one should feel the way that she did growing up.
And the thing that scares me, about the world that we live in, is that I see so much of myself in her. The way she thinks, listens, even sings... she is very similar to me in so many ways. But I am the one who has been given the opportunities. I grew up with all that I needed. I grew up with the world as my oyster and was told to pursue my dreams. A few years ago it hit me that I have a responsibility to make the most of my dreams, for all the Gretchens out there who haven’t been given the chance yet. And maybe, through my life, I can bring some light, some joy, some opportunity to her and to the ones who are still invisible.
To fly and not fall, to run and not stop,
To build and not tear down, to one day be crowned,
To shout and be heard,
To reign in our world,
This is what she’s fighting for,
This is what we’re fighting for.
(Fighting For, 2012, Louise Wright)
We are preparing for a show later in the year, and as part of it, Gretchen will share some parts of her life-story. She’s now 17, but when I met her she was twelve, shy, often late to or absent from choir practice, hardly spoke English, and sang so quietly I hardly knew she had a voice. What she has been through in her life amazes me; growing up without parents, in a dark, opportunity-stealing, dangerous part of the city, surviving on a tiny income, with her older sister pregnant at 15, knowing that she was unwanted.
As I sat talking to this precious girl, she asked me “How did I get here? I’m about to graduate high school and go to the best college in the city. I have travelled to Hong Kong and the USA. I get to perform to so many people... how did I get here?”
Gretchen is a deep thinker. She has a beautiful voice. She has a beautiful, generous and thoughtful spirit. She cares deeply for others. But the thing that amazes me the most about her is the purpose that she now carries. The conviction she has that she is here for a reason; it brings tears to my eyes, even now as I type. She is so determined to make her life mean something. She wants to study psychology and help counsel and guide people who have been through trauma in life. She says that no-one should feel the way that she did growing up.
And the thing that scares me, about the world that we live in, is that I see so much of myself in her. The way she thinks, listens, even sings... she is very similar to me in so many ways. But I am the one who has been given the opportunities. I grew up with all that I needed. I grew up with the world as my oyster and was told to pursue my dreams. A few years ago it hit me that I have a responsibility to make the most of my dreams, for all the Gretchens out there who haven’t been given the chance yet. And maybe, through my life, I can bring some light, some joy, some opportunity to her and to the ones who are still invisible.
To fly and not fall, to run and not stop,
To build and not tear down, to one day be crowned,
To shout and be heard,
To reign in our world,
This is what she’s fighting for,
This is what we’re fighting for.
(Fighting For, 2012, Louise Wright)