Finding a purpose in life: Goretti Nguyen.

Goretti Nguyen was born in Saigon, Vietnam, and migrated to Australia when she was eight years old. There she was reunited with her father who had been separated for six years from the rest of the family as a result of the Vietnam war.

As a teenager she was an avid fan of British pop music in general and of the Birmingham group Duran Duran in particular. So when in the mid-Eighties Bob Geldorf staged his famous Live Aid concert, broadcast round the world, to raise money for the famine in Ethiopia, it caught Nguyen's attention. `I remember trying to stay up through the night, hoping for a glimpse of Duran Duran,' she recalls. `I also remember thinking to myself, "When I grow up I want to help people as well." I remember that pledge as clearly as if I had made it yesterday. But how was I meant to "help people"? I searched for that answer for many years.'

After graduating from university in economics, she just `fell into' her job with a department store group. Promotion came `without any special effort on my side'. All the time she was searching for something more fulfilling. She joined different voluntary groups which might offer an opportunity to `help people'. One of these was Australian Vietnamese Youth Today (AVYT). The meetings were held in a large house called Armagh outside Melbourne. `I regularly ventured in and out,' she says, `although I had no significant contact with the residents. Nor was I particularly interested in what else took place there.' All she knew was that they were involved with something called Moral Re-Armament.

As her dissatisfaction intensified, she decided to take a year's `working holiday' in Britain and other parts of Europe. `I wasn't only after adventure,' she says. `I was ardently hoping to discover a new path for my life.' But after eight months it was cut short by a need to return home on urgent family matters.

With nothing having changed, she went back into a job that seemed even more aimless than before. She felt trapped and without direction. She became physically ill and increasingly mentally stressed. `It was an ordeal just to get up for work each day.' Her parents could not understand the root of her unhappiness. This led to an eventual breakdown in relationships. `They were about the darkest days of my life. I suspected I was approaching a danger point in mind and body.'

After returning home she had resumed her responsibilities with AVYT. This time she began to get to know some of those living in the Armagh house. `One day I found myself having an intimate conversation with a Taiwanese lady and sharing with her all my troubles and heartache. She showed me a brochure about a course they were running called Life Matters. As I read it I was speechless. "Are you looking for hope? What gives meaning to life?" It was as though someone had been reading my mind. I knew I had to attend this course. On false pretences, I excused myself from work.'

Now everything seemed to slot into place. Acquiring new strength from the nine-day course, she made two decisions. `First and foremost to be true to myself and secondly to dare to take a chance. I knew what this meant for me. What I had so far seen, heard and read about MRA spelt hope-giving work. Here were people who put the emphasis on the individual's power to change society--starting with themselves. This was the kind of work which would give purpose to my life, even though there was no financial comfort or security.'

Despite the natural fears of her parents she handed in her resignation. `As if I had forgotten the warmth of the sun on my skin, I felt a return of total body warmth. Yet I had no idea where this choice would take me.'

`Two and a half years later,' she reflects, `I have been taken round the world with adventure as my constant companion. But above all (she is currently National Youth Coordinator for MRA in Australia) I am where I am meant to be--in an environment where I can help young people find purpose and a "quality of life" for themselves. I am now trying to give to others what I myself had for so long been looking and yearning for.'