My career journey has revolved around practice, teaching, research and service. I began as practitioner, then taught part-time. Then I taught full-time, but practiced on the side. My love for research grew along the way and I juggled teaching, practice and research for more than a decade. But my formation as Iskolar ng Bayan and in Student Catholic Action, plus the fact that my grandfather and father were public servants, ingrained in me a sense of duty to country and our people.
Eventually the desire to serve would manifest in my work as a psychologist and my involvements in our professional association and university. As those leadership roles ended, I thought I my life would go back to normal. Then the “war” on drugs began. I found myself thrust into leadership once again and for the past three years, I have been helping to provide more humane and scientific solutions to drug use.
This month, I begin a new role in an internationally funded project to expand access to community-based drug recovery in the Philippines. It was a role I did not expect so it took me a while to discern and consult my family and university. I knew that my life would be busier and more stressful and honestly, it would have been easier to stay in my comfort zone. Fr. Ted Gonzalez once told me that when discerning,, “pumunta ka kung saan mapayapa ang puso mo.” So I waited and in the silence came the answer.
When you say ‘yes’ to something, you say ‘no’ to other things. My energies are finite and because of this new role, I have to give up certain things. I am grateful for the support of my family, Dean Nandy Aldaba and my colleagues in the Ateneo Psych Department and CORD for allowing me the space to take this on. To my friends and colleagues, I ask for your understanding as well as your prayers. The role is daunting but the opportunity to make a greater difference is hard to resist. As my favorite superhero said, “I guess I gotta try. My father once told me, ‘if you see something wrong happening in the world, you can either do nothing, or you can do something.” For now, this is my something.
Eventually the desire to serve would manifest in my work as a psychologist and my involvements in our professional association and university. As those leadership roles ended, I thought I my life would go back to normal. Then the “war” on drugs began. I found myself thrust into leadership once again and for the past three years, I have been helping to provide more humane and scientific solutions to drug use.
This month, I begin a new role in an internationally funded project to expand access to community-based drug recovery in the Philippines. It was a role I did not expect so it took me a while to discern and consult my family and university. I knew that my life would be busier and more stressful and honestly, it would have been easier to stay in my comfort zone. Fr. Ted Gonzalez once told me that when discerning,, “pumunta ka kung saan mapayapa ang puso mo.” So I waited and in the silence came the answer.
When you say ‘yes’ to something, you say ‘no’ to other things. My energies are finite and because of this new role, I have to give up certain things. I am grateful for the support of my family, Dean Nandy Aldaba and my colleagues in the Ateneo Psych Department and CORD for allowing me the space to take this on. To my friends and colleagues, I ask for your understanding as well as your prayers. The role is daunting but the opportunity to make a greater difference is hard to resist. As my favorite superhero said, “I guess I gotta try. My father once told me, ‘if you see something wrong happening in the world, you can either do nothing, or you can do something.” For now, this is my something.