Malala Yousafai is the young Pakistani girl who took the world by storm for her activism. Below are lessons to glean from her life.
1. Stars shine brightest at night. Your hard times are not an excuse for mediocrity, they are instead you reason for shining. Malala grew under one of the most detestable regime – the Taliban. Television was banned, so was music, girls’ education, and women were also banned from going shopping.
2. You must be willing to take some measure of risk. A long average life lived without adventure or achievement is one of the worst things that have befallen mankind. Malala was aware of the risk that laid in speaking out for the education of the girl child against the Taliban, but the Pakistani girls needed a voice, and Malala chose to lend them hers in in spite of the risk to her.
3. What do you see? In early 2009, Taliban militants were taking over the Swat Valley [the region where Malala and family lived] her father who ran a school for girls was asked by a BBC reporter, if any girl at his school would write a blog about life under the Taliban. A girl named Aisha was the best person for the task, and agreed to write, but then her parents stopped her from doing it because they feared Taliban reprisals. The only alternative was Malala, four years younger than Aisha, and in seventh grade at the time. It was this blog that gave young Malala, prominence and made her a Taliban target. Aisha and parents saw something to fear, Malala and parent saw a chance to shine.
4. Until you are willing to die for something, you don’t have reason enough to live. When asked about the death threats she got continually, Malala said: ‘I think of it often and imagine the scene clearly. Even if they come to kill me, I will tell them what they are trying to do is wrong, that education is our basic right’.
5. Whatever doesn’t kill you, will only serve to make you stronger. On 9 October 2012, Malala was shot in the head and neck in an assassination attempt by Taliban gunmen while returning home on a school bus. The Taliban bullet was meant to stop her life and her work, but instead it shot her to global fame.
6. Start with what you have, where you are. Take small step where you are. Stay faithful at it and you will see greater doors open up to you. Malala didn’t set out to be a heroine, she just wanted to make the kind of difference a young girl can make in a female marginalized world. Long before the BBC offer, she’s been writing and speaking about the issue of female education.
7. You have to live for something bigger than you. Let your life mean something to someone, somewhere in the world. let your.life influence even people you'd never get to meet, let your legacy travel through generations.
8. You need role models and mentors, they play a great part in determining your success. Malala was lucky, she found one in her dad. Malala was deeply inspired in her activism by her father who ran schools for girl education before it was shut down by the Taliban. He spoke out about them and got death threats for his stance. The experience got Malala committed to becoming a politician and not a doctor, as she had once aspired to be.
9. The important thing is not what happens TO you, it’s what happens IN you. "The terrorists thought they would change my aims and stop my ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage was born ... I am not against anyone, neither am I here to speak in terms of personal revenge against the Taliban or any other terrorist group. I'm here to speak up for the right of education for every child. I want education for the sons and daughters of the Taliban and all terrorists and extremists." – Malala’s speech at the UN, 12 July 2013 her 16th birthday
10. A great deal of good can come out of something seemingly unpleasant experience: The assassination attempt received worldwide media coverage and produced an outpouring of sympathy and anger. Protests against the shooting were held in several Pakistani cities the day after and over 2 million people signed the Right to Education campaign's petition, which led to ratification of the first Right to Education Bill in Pakistan. Angelina Jolie donated $200,000 to The Malala Fund for girls education. Indian director Amjad Khan announced that he would be making a biographical film based on Malala. Even in your down time there is yet a great deal of good you can do. In 2013 Malala was hosted by president Obama and first lady Michelle Obama at the White House.
11. Your point of pain is an indication to your purpose: On 15 October 2012, UN Special Envoy for Global Education former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, launched a petition titled "I am Malala". The petition's main demand was that there be no children left out of school by 2015, with the hope that "girls like Malala everywhere will soon be going to school. Can you imagine that it took a girl living in female subdued and relegated society and denied education to give hope to the world's 61 million out-of-school children.
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So inspiring...
ReplyDeleteWell said! Thanks
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