I like to whine, a lot, and mostly the reason behind this is my academics. When I am struggling to find the right electronic configuration of a certain element, when I can’t end up with the correct answer in my business math test, when I can’t prove this trigonometric identity, I whimper, I sob out of frustration, I pull my hair until it hurts, I cry out of desperation but I never once give up.

Whenever I study for a long exam, in the middle of memorizing the history of the Filipino Language I find myself asking, “For whom am I doing this for?” “What even is the point of all this” “Is this even worth it.” It may sound familiar especially in times when things get rough and you just don’t find any logical reason on why you are torturing yourself into mastering dates and executive orders. My brain can think of millions of reasons why I should just stop but the fire that drives me to keep on going never dies.

I lost my mother in a very young age. I grew up in a house full of aunts and grandparents. My father’s work requires him to live in a distance away and only comes home every weekend. And in my 16 years of living, I witnessed how my father works hard to provide my siblings and I an education. He never complains how tired he is, how difficult his job is, how much the workload has taken a toll in his body, all he does is try hard, harder and harder to see his children hold a diploma one day.

“Mag aral ka ng Mabuti, kasi ‘yan lamang ang maipapamana ko sa inyo”. My father always says this to us. We aren’t rich, we struggle a lot in finance and without the help of my relatives we probably won’t able to afford much, so when I was able to grasp the meaning behind these words I held on to them because he was right, at the end of the day I won’t have anything with me, not a will or a land or a pot of gold, just a degree I worked hard for.

You see, I am not the best in anything. Unlike some people I know who have some sort of specialization in one particular field that could be in chemistry or mathematics or arts. I don’t have that. I consider myself mediocre at everything (except math, I’m not even close to mediocre, I SUCK AT THAT). Being mediocre is not a bad thing, it just means you have a lot of room to fit your effort into making that “mediocre” grade to outstanding. I am that type of student that has to work hard, study thoroughly and spend hours into a particular subject in order to secure an A, I wish I was one of those learners who gets high grades without the need of studying but then I think about how much different I would feel after working hard and getting a high mark instead of lazily and easily getting one. As they say, the hardships you experience while training is what makes that A taste so sweet.

I don’t consider myself smart but I am a hard-working student. Now that I have been studying for more than 11 years, when I ask myself “Bakit ka ba kase nagpapaka pagod mag type ng research ? Bakit mo iniiyakan yang equation na iyan? Sino ba ang tatanga tanga na matutulog ng 3 am para mag aral at gumising ng alas singko para pumasok?” I always go back to when I ranked high in class and saw the smile on my parents face like they just won a million pesos, like we don’t have problems at home. Whenever I doubt myself, I try to remember my hopes of becoming a physician and the future I never fail to dream at night.

The pursuit of excellence is not a one-day job, you will need to work not only hard, nor harder but you will need to work hardest, you will fail at times, you might want to give up, and if you’re lucky you might succeed but in the finish line whatever picture is in there, everything will be worth it.

As Dr. Ron Baticulon writes in an essay about studying and training “It was certainly not effortless, entailing substantial discipline and sacrifice. Was it worth it? I would say yes.”