Networking - to be or not to be?

My mentor, Khai, recently invited me to the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Association’s mentoring programme launch. I’ve had to navigate in networking contexts before. Last year I was one of the delegates from Sydney Law School to the Australian Law Students Associate (ALSA) annual conference. In many ways the two events felt similar. In many ways the two events felt different.

At ALSA we were all subject to a 20 minute lecture by a managing partner of a large city law firm about the importance of networking. His speech reminded me of a scene from Confessions of a Shopaholic. Asked to write one thousand words on APRs, Rebecca proceeds to do some research. A few moments later her boss appears behind her and exclaims, “Rebecca… did you just type ‘good angles on APRs into Google?” Either that or he just copy and pasted the Wikipedia page on networking. His delivery then reminded me of a scene from the Simpsons.

Mr Burns: Did you get that report on the accounting department?

Homer: Yes sir, I did. "The accounting department is located on the 3rd floor. Its hours are 9am to 5pm. The head of this department is a Mr. Johnson or Johnstone."

Given his enthusiasm I do not think I could be faulted for not seizing the opportunity to market myself to my fellow peers. Bring together a few hundred law students there will be natural diversity of course. Some, like myself and fellow Pinnacle Scholar Veronica Mason, will devote our attention to the mooting and skills competitions. Others will be there for a week of revelry. But at the end of the day you could naturally begin with questions like “which law school are you from” and remark about the differences between their curriculum and yours. You take out your phone and you say, “hey we should add each other on Facebook!” Then you go off to use the bathroom or get another drink and you avoid that person for the rest of the night because you don’t want to talk to them again. That would be awkward. If you bump into them in the hotel lobby the next day, you nod your head in acknowledgement, smile, wave, say hi, but you do not slow down (in fact, quicken your pace in case there was any doubt in their mind about your intentions) and hope you’re not catching the same tram as them. 

Among the company of Sydney’s gay and lesbian business community my enthusiasm for networking was not exactly rekindled. I remember asking Khai at the beginning of the evening, “Do I just go up to people and ask them ‘so, what do you do’? That seems a little rude”. There is a modesty I am accustomed to, both with asking about another person’s private affairs and volunteering information about my own. So without Khai to tell everyone about my clerkship and my judge’s associateship I do not think I could have represented myself in the best light. But because Khai did, everyone was really nice and genuinely engaged me in my life and my achievements. My opinion of networking has recovered.

Society demands networking apparently. It is, at least in business, a fact. An aversion to social interaction with strangers is seen as something shameful by most people. All of my close friends have confessed to me that they feel similarly while admiring my ability to engage strangers in conversation. I don’t feel the need to resolve the question whether my friends and I are in the minority with our anxiety. But I am confident enough to admit it and try my best to overcome it.

By Nathan Li

Induction Day

I really did not know what to expect from the first Pinnacle Induction Day, but I certainly did not expect to meet and hang out with so many lovely and inspiring people. The night before at the hostel was kind of strange to me, the girls in my dorm and I stayed up late talking and sharing jokes. It was the first time ever I felt like I was one of the ‘girls.’ To feel accepted by a group of people who you have never met before was amazing. Other than the social aspect we had some great guest speakers and workshops.

Peter Baldwin’s session during the induction on dealing with stress, anxiety and shame really struck a few chords and provided me with some insight on myself.

Sometimes the “I’m not good enough stories” my brain tells me causes me to not try my absolute best or even completely avoid something. I fear if I do really try and do not succeed it may reinforce the “I’m not good enough” story my brain continuously tells me. Therefore I buy into them.

I loathe public speaking because my brain tells me “I’m not smart enough.” I have to force myself at times when I cannot avoid it and hope that I do not stutter or waffle on and say something silly or embarrassing. 

I remember the night before my driving test I was so nervous I did not sleep at all. I felt almost certain I was going to fail. However I passed and got my license, then I thought why did I wind myself up over nothing? Why the hell do I do this to myself?

It is so annoying that my brain thinks it is being helpful by telling me these stories when it is actually doing the complete opposite. I guess I am my own worst critic and hindrance to achieving what I would like to achieve.

One of my goals for this year is to work on accepting these stories as just stories regardless of whether they ring any truth or not and perhaps work on my confidence. Now that I am aware of this I am sure I will make some progress.

I would like to thank the Pinnacle crew, mentors, scholars, and everyone else who rocked up for an awesome weekend and making it happen; I wish it did not have to end.

By Laura Partington

Expectations- Part I

I’ve been through a lot of difficult situations in my life. The death of my mother, an abusive upbringing, bullying at school, leaving home at 16, and living as a transguy. None of those experiences prepared me for the emotional roller coaster I would experience upon entering college.

I planned, prepared for and looked forward to university with infallible optimism. The fact that I was about to put 500km between myself and my partner of 6 months didn’t even dent it, that's how excited I was. My imagined scenarios of being challenged about my gender and sexuality always ended with me winning and other people feeling foolish. I was sure that I would study hard and find everything interesting and surely succeed in the end.

Someone recently said to me that after your first year at university, the way you see the social world will totally change. I absolutely believe them. When you’re in high school, you feel like everyone is looking at you, and you’re right. The world is small, there are rules and expectations, and you can plan your path with near precision. When you start uni, you feel like there are even more people looking at you, when in reality, they probably haven’t even noticed you exist (unless you do something really fantastic or really terrible). The world is very, very big, rules and expectations are relative and arbitrary, and forget about planning. With one point of view, this can be really scary. With another, it can be freeing.



I’ll tell you, at first, I found it really scary, and I still do, a fair bit. I’ve been feeling incredibly self conscious. I’ve been feeling like everyone thinks I’m a lesbian and I’ve been pretty antisocial towards actual lesbians who have been nice to me, as well as everyone else in general. Now, being a lesbian is far from a bad thing, but the fact is that I’m not one. The assumption that I identify as, and am attracted to women, when I’m the polar opposite is painful. As a result, the way I have felt and acted has been very defensive, sitting alone, not talking to people, and not making eye contact, for fear of being accused of being someone I’m not or doing something I wouldn’t do.

My other issue with university is college life. The whole messy, noisy, drunken, smelly rabble of college life. I’ll be honest- its really not my thing, but its pretty much my only option at the moment. I’ve had plenty of clashes with other people over how much noise they’re making when I’m trying to sleep or study, the fact that there is often vomit and urine in really inappropriate places, the amount of rubbish in the common rooms and the stench in the communal facilities. None of those clashes have been particularly productive, and I’ve been left feeling angry, disappointed, disgusted, and sometimes plain miserable.

So these two issues are what I have been faced with. Don’t think for a moment that I’m overcome by them though. The last few days have been a bit of a turning point. After a long, tough Wednesday night, I returned to the Pinnacle Foundation page, and found the post where I had been introduced, with my photo and the blurb about what the support of the Pinnacle foundation meant to me. The last sentence I wrote was: “Having the Pinnacle Foundation behind me this year will boost my confidence and resolve to achieve great things and give back to the community in the future”, and that was what struck me. Yes, college has its downs. It has ups too. That’s irrelevant to the fact that I am here to achieve great things, for myself, for the world, to show my appreciation to the people sponsoring me and to even act as a role model for up and coming scholars and other young people in my situation.

Its easy to feel like the smallest thing on the face of the earth, but the fact is, as a Pinnacle scholar, I’ve been put before the public eye and I need to remember that. Not in terms of inhibiting what I do, but as a boost of confidence and motivation to stay strong and positive, and deal with problems instead of just complaining about them. Sometimes I will just need to put up with things, sometimes I’ll need to try to solve problems patiently and positively, but no good will come of being negative.

My issue with how other people are looking at me, and feeling like I’m perceived as a lesbian, is something my mentor is helping me with. I talked to him about this today, and he explained to me that I should try expecting nothing, and accepting everything- that is, to stop judging the looks other people are giving me as nasty, and be open to the fact that maybe they’re just curious about me, or even want to be friends. I haven’t really had a chance to try that yet. That’s why the title of this post is succeeded by ‘Part I’- I don’t know how it will go, but I’ll let you know.

By Ashton Brenton

My Trans Man Journey

*Note: this blog contains a post-surgery photo*

Let me take this opportunity to introduce myself. I’m 21 years old and a peer support worker in the mental health sector. There is no career that I want to do other than to be a psychologist. I find mental health interesting and I want to do all that I can to help others. I’m also a male who was born female bodied. Since starting testosterone a couple of years ago, people I meet would never guess that I wasn’t born male bodied.

I was awarded a Pinnacle scholarship in late 2011. It couldn’t have come at a better time. At that point in my life, I was saving every bit of money that I could for my chest corrective surgery. I dreaded puberty since I first heard about what was going to happen to my body. I cringed at the thought of bleeding monthly and was terrified that my chest would grow into something that wasn’t me. I convinced myself that it wouldn’t happen because it wasn’t supposed to. But unfortunately my body betrayed me.

I used to wear 3 t shirts, a jumper and a jacket to hide my chest. I was so ashamed of it. Then when I heard about binders (which are garments that compress the chest really tight), I got one. It made my chest flat and I was less ashamed of it. But when I started taking testosterone, my voice broke and I started growing lots of body hair. It felt even more like my chest didn’t belong even when binding. Binding was very painful and I felt jealous that I couldn’t take my shirt off at the beach like every other guy could.

It all built up on me and I needed to have my chest corrected. I looked at my options. I didn’t have $7,000 to pay for the surgery and I didn’t have a job or any family support. My only option was to get health insurance, wait the compulsory year on it which I thought would be enough time to save up a few thousand dollars to pay for the surgery. The wait and having no money was unbearable. I become very depressed but I pushed through because I kept imagining how great it would feel to have the right chest. It ended up costing a total of $4,140. I realised that I wouldn’t be able to come up with the money in time for payment so I held a fundraiser and I ended coming up with the money through that and donations from friends.

The surgery was a complete success and the surgeon said it couldn’t have gone better. It was such a relief to hear that all the time I spent in the gym preparing my body for it and all the time I spent broke worked out. When I saw my chest for the first time, I hadn’t smiled that big in a long time.

Where I am at now

Looking back at about seven months ago, it is more than clear that receiving a Pinnacle Scholarship has turned my life around. Seven months ago I had absolutely no idea I would end up studying Youth Work and Alcohol & Other Drugs at RMIT University, and have an amazing mentor. At that time I was experiencing accommodation instability and started to not believe in myself. I began thinking about giving up on my hopes and dreams and re-prioritising my goals.

Receiving a Pinnacle Scholarship means more to me than the financial assistance with course fees and materials. Don’t get me wrong, it has saved me from great financial stress and provided me with relief; however it is the fact that someone saw something in me and believed in me that made me feel that there is hope. So I decided then I was not going to give up that easy.

Now I’m doing well in my courses and have an awesome placement working with a very diverse and creative group of same-sex attracted young people. I love this placement so much it does not feel like work at all. My partner sometimes gets a bit annoyed that I do not spend a lot of time at home due to classes and placement commitments, but she knows that in the end it would be all worth it and she sees that I am happy.

My mentor Lauren is an incredible lady. I honestly could not have asked for a better mentor. She simply ROCKS! Lauren has done so much for me in the past few months. Not only does she assist me with my assignments and finding placement opportunities, she also took me to my first professional development conference about mental health and social media. This challenged me a little because I have never been around so many professionals before. I’m glad she did take me because shortly after that my placement supervisor out of the blue asked me to attend the Hume City Council’s launch of their Youth Counselling Service on his behalf. I was more confident with meeting other professionals and networking with them.

Lauren has also helped me solve my first ethical dilemmas as a Youth Worker such as: boundaries and being torn between being a friend and a worker. I’m extremely lucky to have Lauren as my mentor. She is kind, hilarious and great to talk. I hope to stay in touch with her after the mentorship. I could go on for ages about the awesomeness of Lauren but I guess you get the idea that she is my idol, so I will stop here.

Being a Pinnacle Scholar is a great honour and privilege. It changed the way I perceived my life. When I officially start working in the community services sector I would not hesitate in recommending the Pinnacle Foundation to my future clients to help them achieve their full potential and get them where they would like to go in life.

By Laura Partington

Photos in My Window

My name is Ashleigh and this is a photo of my bedroom window.

One day I will become a radiographer, and then maybe another day I will become qualified in MRI or CT imaging. My partner is not the biggest fan of using the windows to display pictures of bones of people she doesn’t know, but for the most part she puts up with them because they remind me that the light at the end of the tunnel is a degree, a job and being able to do something I love every day. 

I took these radiographs during my very first clinical placement in 2010.  My favourite is the smaller one on the left window, an AP PEG open-mouth image. At the time, these images were a source of pride, a reminder that I could do just as well as anyone else who was doing the same course as me. A reminder that I had achieved just as much, if not more then those students who had a comfy bed to sleep in, financial and emotional support and enough food during these five weeks of unpaid placement. I slept on the floor of a friends place for the 5 weeks and ate rice for every meal, but I did well enough in my placement for me to feel proud of myself.

At the end of 2011, Pinnacle came into my life when I was working 6 days a week, although often for 14 days or more in a row. It took me a year to recover financially from the placement, and Pinnacle entered my life at a time when I was about to give up on my education, and focus on just being able to afford the rent and food in the same week.

I was teetering on the edge of living my greatest fear -  that I will just ‘get by’ in life. That I will end up ‘just’ waitressing everyday for the rest of my life, ‘just’ making rent, ‘just’ making it. That I will plod through life, doing something that disintegrates my enthusiasm, kills my brain cells, and refuses to allow me the opportunity to hope and dream of bigger and better things.

Pinnacle has seemingly scooped me up from the floor, dusted me off, handed me some hope and given me a gentle shove back in the right direction. They have patched up some holes where my self-esteem obviously fell out, and are doing their damnedest to make sure that my potential stays firmly in my pocket, and doesn’t self-destruct in a moment of panic. Pinnacle has given me gifts that most students take for granted; encouragement, support, confidence, hope, financial stability and the ability to believe in myself.

By Ashleigh Scriven