GUILT

I had the first opportunity in at least 3 months to access professional supervision last week. I've juggled two jobs, one as a caseworker for asylum seekers and the other as a support worker in a homeless shelter, so as a result I had a lot to de-brief about.

I expressed during the session that one of the things I keep thinking about is how 'the only reason why I am not in the same shitty situation as asylum seekers [in how I came to be in Australia], is that my parents had the money to pay for the student visa, the school fees, the apartment we lived in, the boarding school, and finally, the permanent residency visa!'

The supervisor looked at me thoughtfully and said, 'Rani, do you feel guilty for these things?'

I exploded: 'OF COURSE I FEEL GUILTY! GUILT IS THE MAIN PROPELLING FACTOR IN MY LIFE! I THINK THE ONLY REASON I EVER BECAME A SOCIAL WORKER IS BECAUSE OF GUILT!'

I added somewhere along the lines that I also had, *sigh*, hang-ups about being born Chinese. I have had plenty of opportunities to develop such a hang-up. All the discriminatory attitudes towards Chinese people in Indonesia, the accusations of Chinese people being the richest of a poor nation, the ways in which 'Chinese!' has been used as a taunting insult to my face, both in Indonesia as well as in Australia- although bigots of this country tend to say, 'Chink!'

This surprise outburst left me feeling winded. But oh no, the supervisor did not give me a chance to take a breath, because the next thing she said trigerred heaving sobs from me:

'Rani, you are not a bad person for having been born into a rich, Chinese family.'

Oh dear. Open the floodgates. Let loose the wolves! Bring on the thunderstorms and expunge a decade's worth of guilt from your lungs! Go on!

So I did.

Then I asked her to repeat what she had just said because it was the sweetest phrase I had heard in a long long time.

Later on in the week, I recounted this experience to a fellow actor-in-training who is working for a well-established international aid organisation.

She responded with surprising enthusiasm and shared how so many people in her workplace suffer from 'white people's guilt', especially when it comes to working with Indigenous peoples.

She then shared her opinion that if all of her co-workers had a similar realisation to the one that I have just had, it may convert the driving force of their work from '90% guilt and 10% inspiration into 90% inspiration and 10% guilt'.

After wiping my tears away and calming down somewhat, the supervisor then encouraged me to do 'what it is that makes your heart sing'. I had a ready answer for this: 'performing, acting'.

Then I laughed. Because just saying it was a relief. Because just hearing it was a relief.

So many fears come with this realisation. But I was reading an article in the New Internationalist that gave me hope. The May 2010 issue of New Internationalist is devoted to the situation in Iraq post-USA-invasion.

One expose looks at the state of artists surviving in Iraq. A particularly inspiring anecdote relates how a recent theatre production in Baghdad involved professional actors as well as amateur actors, some of whom were militia men. 'One of them... became so enamoured of the theatre that he actually left his militia to become a professional actor.'

Surely, if a militia man can make the decision to turn his life around and become an actor, a social worker can turn her life around and become an actor?

DISENCHANTMENT

After 6 months fresh out of university, I am considering a career change.


To be honest, halfway through my Social Work degree, I discovered the wonders of "theatre" and only completed the degree as I had convinced myself that the discipline of finishing what you have started is indeed, a virtue. Now, with a degree I only half-heartedly completed (but still excelled at, mind you!) I am left wondering whether this was the best attitude to have taken.


That said, I have had some challenging experiences that I will not regret having had. They continue to inform my sense of ethics and how I relate to people in the world, striving for empathy and a practice of non-judgementalism.

How many actors-in-training can say that, I ask you?


The challenge I am confronted with now, however, is not so much a matter of adhering to ethics, or committing to my principles... it has more to do with the lack of financial stability that I am finding whilst working for organisations that I truly believe in.


I first came across the need for better financial management and better prioritising of fundraising in the 'community sector' when I did an internship for an organisation that campaigns for international aid justice.


A job opportunity came up for which I was a likely candidate, but knowing the difficult financial situation that the organisation was in, I declined. I thought that I would be put in a position where I needed to find funding for my own position whilst still expected to fulfill the other obligations of my role as one half of a very small campaigning team.


Picturing the stress and insecurity that such an arrangement would involve, I decided to avoid the unstable situation. In addition, I had seen the people who filled these roles leave as a result of feeling 'burnt-out' and 'over-worked'.


Sadly, I find myself in exactly such a situation now, whilst working for a different independent organisation. I work for an organisation that advocates and provides (to a limited extent) for the welfare of asylum seekers- a purpose I hold in high regard.

However, after scantly 3 months there, I have been told that the organisation's future is at risk, given its dire financial situation.

Why, oh why do all these organisations whose values I truly believe in, and whose work I know to be essential in making this country and indeed, the world, a better place (however small its contribution), why- do they keep dissolving into an unsustainable mess?