Young enough to know everything?

I’d like to thank all those who sent me e-mails on my article last week, which had to do with cyberjacking. I didn’t realize it would generate the kind of interest it did, especially from the young. It’s the title that must have attracted them: "Hijacking the heart." It was, after all, a Valentine article.

One young reader from Quezon City made a very strong statement, however, about my use of the word "hijack" in connection with the heart. A student by the name of Lorenz Mamaril, he really lashed out about the metaphors I used.

Though I am certain everyone will agree with me that each one is entitled to his or her own opinion, I do not and did not dispute in my article Mr. Mamaril’s reference to the heart as a God-given organ. It was not necessary because we know that God created mankind and endowed him with every organ he’s got.

I have no intention of making this a debate on religious dogma, but there is simply no bone of contention here because we share the same faith that God created mankind. Lorenz and I have an identical faith as to the divine origin of humanity. Using the phrase "hijack" in connection with the heart was not meant to be derogatory to an organ God created. But I was glad to read his e-mail and am glad to clarify that we are on the same wavelength.

One housewife, Soledad Ferreira from Surigao, however, was very encouraging and said in her e-mail that the article was a "good Valentine article where I learned so much." She said she was a new mother who had to suspend her law studies for a while because of the delivery of her first child, but was determined to go back to the pursuit of a law degree as soon as possible.

I like receiving e-mails from the young. You can see that whenever they put down their thoughts and ideas, sincerity and determination characterize the effort. When they protest and complain about what we mature adults have done or written, they are, by and large, motivated by pure intentions.

It is interesting — in fact, very heart-warming — for me to receive e-mails that go into a long philosophical discourse on why they cannot completely agree with me or why they think the views expressed are off-tangent from theirs.

Free speech, by the way, belongs very definitely to the youth as well. I remember what one mature adult said about the youth: "Like its politicians and its wars, society has the teenagers it deserves." Remember, too, what Henry Adams once said: "Young men have a passion for regarding their elders as senile."

One mother said a very real thing, though: "Oh, to be half as wonderful as my child thought I was when he was small, and only half as stupid as my teenager now thinks I am." That, by the way, happens to be the story of life. The youth today are as we were yesterday, and our parents before us in their own youth. We just have to live life well.

I have certainly no intention of forcing my views and my metaphors on the young. I feel good when they have questions and comments about my articles. I was a law professor for 10 years, and remember those years as enjoyable and fulfilling ones. And I have three young sons and an only daughter who I think are great people, though I get really nostalgic about those days of long ago when, as little children, they were completely dependent on their late father and me for their fun and pleasures and happiness. Then, suddenly, all too soon you find out that they have grown up all too fast. That’s the reason why it is important during these youthful years that the fundamental values and the moral code get instilled and grow with them.

Just as I do not force my views on them as adults now, I think senior executives in many business organizations now have veered away from the values-imposed approach to the shared-values concept. Once upon a time, a lot of senior managers took the shared-values concept to mean they should go on a week-long retreat in a place far from the harrowing, hurrying throng, in order to formulate a corporate credo, then return and announce it to their constituents. Some business gurus confess to the fact that they were, at one time, advocates of this exercise.

It is already pretty well known that experience has taught the corporate world that in spite of the extent and strength of top management’s support of shared values, leaders cannot impose their values on their constituents. It has been proven time and time again that consensus with the constituency is difficult to attain, and without consensus, there can be no consistent implementation of values throughout an organization or a business corporation.

I learned this early enough in government: the constituents must be involved in the creative process, the constituents have to have a hand, if not directly, through chosen representatives, in creating the shared values.

Those of you who have read some of Barry Posner’s treatises on leadership are familiar with what he has time and again espoused, that "shared values don’t result from laminated wallet cards, televised broadcasts, posters embellished with calligraphy, auditorium speeches or executive roundtables. Shared values are instead the result of listening, appreciating, building consensus and practicing conflict resolution. For people to understand the values and come to agree with them, they must participate in the process because unity is forged, not forced."

And if there is anything the youth cannot take in this day and age, it is to have anything forced upon them to swallow and imbibe.

Francis Bacon said in his celebrated collection of essays Of Youth and Age that "There is an inexplicable fierceness in the young to resist even advice gently given, or a narration of values they are forced to uphold. Youth always does come strong, and they sting and they bite."

Writing my weekly column is getting to be such a nourishing experience for me — a fuller understanding of youth’s cravings, aspirations and dreams from the commentaries and reactions of the young reader is a gift I never expected from this exercise.

One experienced father said: "I am not young enough to know everything."

Indeed, the wise fathers have, through the ages, concluded that by the time a man realizes that maybe his father was right, he usually has a son who thinks he’s wrong.

And the same goes for mothers and daughters, I guess.

* * *

Thanks for your e-mail sent to jtl@pldtdsl.net.