Whatever It Takes

  Hi everyone!

This is your host Sayar Henry, and OMG, I’m back with another season of this podcast! I cannot believe I’m recording a brand-new episode right now for my listeners. And this episode is very special to me, and here is why. As I was writing script for this, I was thinking that I should be able to publish this episode on 18th of June, 2022. The reason for that is 18 June was the day I published the first ever episode of this podcast exactly one year ago. So if I managed to publish this one on this particular date, it’d become an anniversary episode for me and my listeners, right? That is why I’m so .. so… happy and thrilled to be working on this.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank my listeners who have been following my podcast since Day 1, and every new listener who has joined this journey ever since. Without you, without your countless hours of listening, and spreading good words about my podcast to the ones you care about, I wouldn’t have made it this far.

Thank you so…much from the bottom of my heart.

And most importantly, as I look back on my episodes throughout the past seasons, I noticed that I’ve covered some important events that happened in Myanmar over the course of one year. I managed to create episodes that more or less reflect the journey of how our people had been resisting the military coup and fighting for democracy & freedom all over the country. Did I cover how we had to overcome the devastating third wave of COVID-19 with limited oxygen supply? I did. Did I make an episode that marked the time our people’s movement officially transformed into armed revolution? Yes, I did that too. And what about how we had to overcome an extremely hot summer with unbelievably limited electricity? Of course, I covered that too.

So, in a way, some of these episodes serve as reflections of all these tough times in Myanmar as we try to sculpt the new history of this country. I feel like creating this podcast, season after season, allowed me to be a part of this history in ways I never would have imagined otherwise.  

And at the same time, I realized how much we all had to power through — the good, the bad, and everything in between. There is no doubt the People of Myanmar have achieved incredible milestones in this Spring Revolution. But there are also heart-breaking losses we can never get back. Many of us — both in rural and urban areas — have already lost homes, villages, families, friends, jobs, properties, education, health, career, dreams, and even lives. Sometimes, on really bad days, I even start to wonder if these sufferings and nightmares will ever end. Have the good people not lost enough? What more do we have to give?

And the more I think about our losses, the deeper I get to reflect on what we are fighting for. Along the way, I began to see a different angle and things started to become much clearer to me. And because it radically changed the way I see things, I’m going to share it with you today.

To keep things in perspective, I’m going to talk about some common things in our life that most of us can relate to. But before doing that, allow me to talk about a seemingly unrelated topic first — success and passion.

Now, many people strongly believe that passion is an essential ingredient that can drive a person to the ultimate success, and that without a passion, a person cannot reach his or her full potential. Well, in general, that sounds true and inspiring. But if we dissect everything that ‘success’ represents, we’ll see that passion alone can’t make a person successful. I mean even if you know what you are passionate about, you still have to put in the work to make use of that passion, right?

For example, let’s imagine that you are a person who loves writing and you fancy to be a published author. You clearly know that you have a passion to write. But to really become an author, you can’t just keep doing only the work you love such as reading and writing. You also need to work on the business side of writing books such as dealing with publishers, marketing your books, and promoting your work through several media platforms. If you don’t do or deal with all of these, you will never become a published author. And even if you did manage to publish your book, your sales may take a hit and you won’t be ‘successful’. This kind of thing always happen if you only want to work on the easy part, which in this case is your talent of writing, and don’t want to commit to all other skills that being a successful author demands. In another word, you’re not fully giving what it takes to become a full-blown author. And in return, you are not getting exactly what you want.

So the important question in this case is whether you are committed to becoming a published author, or you are just romanticizing the idea of becoming an author based on your passion. If you’re not committed to giving everything it takes, you’re not going to get there. It is as simple as that.

But surprisingly, most of us tend to forget this simple concept of quid pro quo. I mean, as a language teacher, I have met with so many students who say how much they want to be fluent in English all the time. I often had to give them the general advice on language acquisition which is to practice two to three hours a day, four to five days a week, and for up to three years.  But in reality, only a handful of them managed to acquire the language at their desired level. The rest can never seem to achieve it, no matter how many years have passed. The reason is simple. Most learners are just interested and excited to be fluent in English. They are not fully committed to giving all the long-term efforts and years of practice it takes to truly acquire the language. Once they realize it is going to be a long journey and see the path ahead as rough, they tend to navigate away from the commitment and stop giving what it takes.

And I believe the same can be said about relationships or body transformation. When you are in love and in a relationship with someone, you can’t just choose to give easy parts you are good at; you have to work hard on the areas you suck at too. If both of you are not willing to give as much as you are expecting to take from each other, you will never experience and appreciate the full package of benefits offered by a committed relationship.

Similarly, if you want to have a great looking body, you have to work out regularly, give up all the bad eating habits, and change your lifestyle completely. And you can’t just do it for a few months. You have to give all in and live the healthy lifestyle for years and years.

The point is, you don’t even have to be passionate about solving problems in a relationship or trick yourself to enjoy working out and eating healthy. All you need to do is show up every day and give what it takes. In another word, it doesn’t matter whether you have a passion or not. You can be successful in anything if you do what it takes.

Now, with that perspective in mind, let’s look at what we’ve been going through in our country.

Over the past year, we have lost our parents, children, brothers, sisters, students, teachers, doctors, and people from all walks of life. With such loss, we are burdened with all the tears, anger, pain, guilt, and negative emotions almost every day. Sometimes, these bombarding waves of sadness can trick us into letting go of what we are fighting for, forcing us to give up entirely especially on the days we feel like we can’t take it anymore.   

But think of it like this.

The negative experiences we have been going through are inevitable parts of this journey. The nature of what we are fighting for, the path we have chosen, and the missions we are willingly supporting demand blood, sweat and tears from millions of people, not to mention time and money. We can’t just fight the evil military and not pay the price it takes. We are in an armed revolution. Of course, we have to give more. Like … a lot more from every one of us.

It’s because nothing this big has ever been achieved before by the people of Myanmar against the military junta throughout the country’s history. We are fighting for the ultimate freedom – something we have never had before. So it’s going to take what we have never given before and we have to make peace with that if we are to keep moving forward.

And here’s the thing.

If we have to suffer all these for years and years just for the sake of suffering, we wouldn’t even be doing it because it’s not worth it.

But if years of our suffering can put an end to decades of suffering for the whole country, hell yeah, we’re going to do it.

So, my friend, let’s keep moving forward together, shall we?

And let’s keep giving not just what we have, but whatever it takes.

Ladies and gentlemen, you’ve been listening to Voice of Sayar Henry Podcast, and this is the end of Episode No. 1 of Season 5. Thank you so much for spending time with me today. And I hope to see you again in the next episode. Goodbye for now.