Christine Zialcita, Businesswoman

Christine B. Zialcita is a businesswoman and a Placement Consultant of Jobsdb Phils Inc. She is also an instructor and partner of The English Chatroom, an English-language training center for professionals. Christine may be reached at Christine.z@jobsdb.com.ph.

The Meaning of My Life

Last week, we were assigned to write on the topic “The Meaning of My Life” for our basic counselling class.  The exercise was intended to prepare us for a discussion on Alfred Adler’s Theory on Style of Life but what it really accomplished is to get each one of us to do self-examination of our lives and how it is truly valued.

So, I got to thinking about how I have lived my life. Initially, my thoughts were focused on the search for knowledge.  I’ve always lived my life asking “WHY?” or thinking “IF I DON’T DO THIS I WILL NOT KNOW” so I’ve gotten myself into a lot of exciting adventures, wonderful experiences and into scrapes and major troubles too. 

However, these were learning experiences which has led me to be wiser in my present living; therefore, no regrets. 

Then came the influx of self-help books.  After getting into the bandwagon of readers, I ended up focusing on happiness too.  So at this point, it wasn’t just the need to know that made me do things, I sought out what everybody referred to as “HAPPINESS”. 

Will this activity make me happy?  Will being with these people make me happy?  What will make me happy?  Is it having money?  Being employed?  Will getting married bring happiness or remaining single?  I sat down and dealt with each of these questions and many more.  Most especially, the question “What is happiness?”

It took me a while to figure out what real happiness is and it was only then that the realization of what my life truly meant dawned on me.  Since the turn of the century, I have owned a restaurant and closed it too.  I have gotten myself formally employed for essentially the first time in my life and this provided me the opportunity to make new friends as well as grow professionally.

 I was eventually given permission to go on an indefinite leave from work allowing me to earn a graduate degree in education which led me to teaching in an exclusive all-girls college.  I was financially stable.  I was rich in friends.  I had work.  An average student in my younger years, I finally graduated with honors.  At this point, I had a lot to celebrate and be happy about. 

But a year and a half ago, I also learned that I inherited a medically incurable illness from my mother which according to the doctors, make me a candidate for the sudden death syndrome. 

The illness was supposed to hamper my life in the sense that I was always on the watch from getting tired, getting dehydrated, running out of oxygen and passing out.  And yet, in May 2007, I was invited by the new parish priest of the church I’ve gone to since childhood to help out and be its communications director.  I could not say “NO” nor did I want to say “NO”.  And from then on, I’ve never been happier in my life nor felt any better. 

So much so that today, I am teaching a full load of 15 units in the exclusive all-girls college (despite being a part-time faculty member), gone back to working as a consultant at JobsDB, working on church projects and part of its choir as well as teaching a subject in the Major Seminary of the OSJ (Oblates of St. Joseph) Congregation every Monday. 

Yes, every single day of the week is packed with activities and things to do and what has given meaning to it all is the underlying sense of “SERVICE” that each of these activities present, and all by the grace of GOD.

I share this story to you now to give you a feel of what this whole column will be all about.  In the coming months we will discover together the many ways in which we can all find our happiness outside of the necessities of life – like work.  That there are activities out there, besides that which will financially compensate us, that will add meaning to our existence.