InkSights: the question after okay

“Okay ka lang?” “Okay lang.” It may be one of the shortest conversations in a school day. We hear it in corridors, classrooms, canteens, group chats, perhaps while somebody is packing a bag after class. Most of the time, we accept the answer and move on. Fair enough. Sometimes okay really does mean okay. But while reading the second-round columns from our recent InkSights column writing workshop for young journalists in Western Visayas, I began noticing something else: the better pieces were less interested in proving that somebody was secretly hurting than in wondering why two ordinary words could carry so many different things.

That was also what made the regional writing exercise harder than it first appeared. “When ‘I’m okay’ really means ‘I’m struggling’” already invites sympathy. Almost anyone can write that people hide problems, that friends should listen, and that kindness matters. All true. Yet when several contestants are working from the same prompt, sincerity alone cannot distinguish one column from another. Our workshop pieces themselves showed the possibilities: writers explored fear of judgment, the pressure of being the strong one, the difficulty of explaining what one feels, and the uncomfortable possibility that we sometimes ask Kumusta? without being quite prepared for the real answer.

The pieces I remember best usually gave me a person before giving me a lesson. There was a friend noticing somebody staring blankly during class. There was a cheerful young person who found it much harder to talk about what she actually felt. There was the panganay carrying expectations, doing well, joining competitions, and still finding private moments to cry.  These details worked because columns live comfortably in such small spaces. A column does not always need to begin by announcing that mental health is important. Sometimes a tap on the shoulder is enough.

There was much to celebrate in that instinct. The promising writers were beginning to understand that personal experience can be a doorway to something larger. The English standouts included JL L. Lagdamen’s A Smile Called Survival, Junrie Paul G. Fortaleza’s The Masks We Wear, Blythe Andi C. Penticase’s Smiling Faces, Silent Battles, Jayden Lyle Darcy V. Tonogan’s Maybe Boths of Us are Special, and France Lorraine B. Quiatson’s Behind the Smile: Unsure Feelings. In Filipino, Ma. Thea Graciela C. Galia’s Katotohanan o Katahimikan?, Jaybee-Ann B. Macahilo’s Okay Lang Ako, and Nhick Andrei T. Mencino’s Mata at Medalya stood out among the promising pieces. My salute goes to them, and just as warmly to the other young journos still learning what their own voices can do.

The harder lesson is that a moving story is not automatically a finished column. “I was struggling, nobody knew, and I cried alone” may be deeply personal, but the columnist still has another job: to ask what the experience revealed and how it might connect with others. Perhaps the writer once wondered why nobody noticed, then realized how carefully he or she had learned to appear fine. Perhaps somebody wanted to be asked Kumusta? but automatically answered okay lang when the question finally came. That contradiction is where the column starts thinking. Experience gives us material; reflection gives the experience meaning. The workshop pieces were strongest when they made that turn.

We also need some restraint, especially with a subject this delicate. A quiet classmate is not automatically depressed. The loudest laugh does not prove hidden trauma. “I’m okay” can mean “I’m fine,” but it can also mean “not now,” “this is private,” or “I do not yet know how to tell you.”   That distinction is not merely sensitivity; it is journalism. We observe what we can establish and remain careful about what we cannot. Even care can become intrusive when it assumes that another person owes us a confession.

The same discipline applies to evidence. Some workshop entries reached for surveys, percentages, agencies, and studies, which is a good instinct when the information is sound. But “according to Google” is not sourcing, and a dramatic statistic does not become useful merely because it has a percent sign. UNICEF has reported that stigma, misconceptions, and the fear of being labeled can keep children and families from seeking mental-health and psychosocial support. That evidence gives context to the students’ observations without giving us permission to diagnose the person sitting beside us.

There is also a useful reality check for young writers tempted to end every such column with “Speak up.” Speaking up matters, but a struggling student should not have to explain everything before help comes. The Basic Education Mental Health and Well-Being Promotion Act now provides for school-based mental-health programs, Care Centers, and new school counselor positions, while DepEd’s Learners TeleSafe Helpline (#33733) has been linked directly to the National Center for Mental Health Crisis Hotline for referrals. That leaves us with a harder question. Instead of merely asking young people why they do not speak, perhaps schools, families, friends, and adults can also examine what happens when they do.

For column writers headed toward DSPC, RSPC, and NSPC, this may be the more lasting lesson. At one level, learn the craft: find the angle, stay with it, verify the facts, let experience deepen into insight, and resist ending with a motivational poster. As I have been trying to say and show all along, beyond contests and awards, journalism asks us to notice people too easily ignored or misunderstood. That takes courage, but also humility. We are learning, too. I certainly am.

Perhaps that is why I came away from InkSights less interested in teaching young writers what a “winning column” looks like. I would rather see them become curious enough to look twice, fair enough not to invent what they cannot know, and brave enough to write when something deserves attention. The next time somebody says, “I’m okay,” a columnist does not have to declare that the person is secretly broken. Maybe the better instinct is the same one good journalism has always required: do not rush past the easy answer. Stay with the question a little longer.

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Doc H fondly describes himself as a “student of and for life” who, like many others, aspires to a life-giving and why-driven world grounded in social justice and the pursuit of happiness. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the institutions he is employed or connected with.