Eureka!

One of the main aspects of my work at the Women’s Center was to setup up a workshop/youth camp for young Latinas in the area to teach them of the tools of empowerment. However, after coming here spending almost a month with and getting to know these girls I began to see that not even a week long camp could be enough to time to give these girls the long-term tools to begin the process of respecting themselves. Weeks of craving a solution to this seemingly impossible problem resulted in the eureka of Finding Esperanza: A Sustainable Latina Empowerment Program.
This program inspired by the support group concept that thrives the Posse Scholarship program at Brandeis takes a shape as to fit the settings and problems of the community the girls here are facing.  So last week after my boss told me to make a presentation of the both the workshop and the long-term program I had just proposed, I knew that my pitch had to be perfect. I had worked on the presentation by bits a pieces, then pitched it to Zev, Pamela and many of my co-workers. I encouraged them to ask questions about the loopholes, risks and gaps within my presentation and pursued to keep editing till the day of our meeting.  Thursday was the fateful day. After going out to what turned out to be a really fun, lunch with my boss and my…other boss, Delia and Rebecca, Delia told me to meet her in her office in a few minutes to have our meeting.
The moment had arrived.
I began the presentation just as I had practiced pitching earlier and all while attempting to keep close watch over her facial reactions expressions and answering her questions that dashed in here and there. My adrenalin was rushing, so pure, for the first time in a longtime and I buzzed through the logic of facts and statistics in my head. Never in my life had I felt so right, as I did in that moment. Delia listened intently and her smiles drove my nervous passion into its most appealing, and natural state. As I reached the final slide and listened to her wise words of advice in pursuing such a lofty program, I could see that the obstacles she had laid out as the greatest were realistically surpass able and this program in fact, could occur. And then. She said it. “ Well, lets give it a try.” Had such a vague confirmation had ever felt so incredibly thrilling? Never.
 To think! The simple possibility that the program could be the first step to getting these girls out of the jail cell of their community, which in fact expects nothing more of their potential than to be the sole generators of evolution. So I realized in this small story of the week, that rewards can sometimes come in quite small packages, in my case of a few words. The true validation however, comes in you feeling the rush that comes with being on the hot trail. Knowing, after weeks of confusing, vague and contradicting evidence, that you have finally come upon something … solid.
True Eureka.

If you want to check out the presentation, I think you can view it here:

file:///Users/Supreetha/Documents/Empowerment%20Workshop.htm