Lessons From Veterans: CSY

ALASKA, CP Army Hub Headquarters – In this weekly series, we pay our Club Penguin army veterans a penny for their thoughts. We’re here to learn their Venmo information as well as find and share their wisdom through interviews. What can we learn from this edition?

CSY

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Lessons from Veterans is a simple way to learn more and find wisdom you otherwise wouldn’t have found. We look up to our legends and veterans for their outrageous amount of years here and their ability to pull out of harrowing experiences. In our eighth edition of Lessons from Veterans, let’s take a look at CSY’s experience and wisdom.

Experience

The veteran we look at today began his army career in early 2015. His home army has been the Army of Club Penguin from the beginning and is where he resides today. CSY gained an AUSIA leadership position in several armies. He led ACP, Doritos, and eventually Water Vikings for a short period. Every army he joins he supports the AUSIA team and grows them. During his earlier tenure in armies, CSY also became CEO of the news site SMAC. Now he leads Army of Club Penguin once again, simultaneously moderates cparmies, and advises our beloved CP Army Hub. Let’s learn some things this veteran brings from all of this now.

What is the general theme you’ve tried to uphold in CPA?

One of the new gen ACP themes have been “We rise from this”, and I think that’s a sort of motto I try to uphold in CPA. We’re not perfect in any sense of the word (whatever perfection is when it comes to armies or leading them!) – but we can always strive to improve ourselves – be it battle style, our community, or us in general. I’ve always believed that if we can’t make mistakes online – where can we? With this in mind, we’ve always tried to give people second chances, especially if they apologize or show a genuine attempt to rectify their behavior – and more often than not, it’s these people that surprise you the most – which IMO is possibly one of the most amazing things ever to witness and be a part of.

What was the hardest thing you’ve overcome in your CPA career?

Perhaps the hardest thing I’ve had to overcome was myself. In OG CPA, I was well known for retiring and coming back constantly – and that was mainly because I was constantly trying to “leave a mark” – a sprint to be “relevant” somewhat – I’d return to hit decent sizes for an army in AUS, but then quickly burn out from the recruiting, calling, and the overall grind. What I’ve tried to change in this generation is the overall stamina – returning to ACP, the goal in mind was to raise it to stability and that’s what I think our greatest achievement is. In consideration of building a welcome community to all, I think the biggest thing I’ve realized is that armies isn’t just a push to break records, but a marathon to build a stable community – and that’s the biggest thing I’ve overcome.

What lessons have you learned from here that have transferred over to real life?

Hmm, whilst I was never naive enough to believe in binary morality, I am, from armies, realizing just how much “gray” area there actually is. I always knew there was 2 sides to every story, but I always thought that with communication, these 2 sides may possibly reconcile after understanding the other. However, often, even understanding both sides of the coin, you realize that there is perhaps sometimes no way to reconcile the two parties – an example was that a Help Force troop was caught troop stealing, leading to some anti-HF sentiments in the staff chat, which was leaked during WWR, leading to our previous allies switching sides and declaring war on us. Both sides were justifiably angry at each other – just because the context was given doesn’t mean they didn’t have a right to see it as a breach of our alliance. Just because something is “justified” doesn’t mean others can’t be angered over it – which is very often the case of conflicts irl too. For example, our surgical association recently reformed for 2020-2021, and the members decided to remove one of the executive committee members due to inadequate work in the past year – he was, understandably, angered over it – and instead of holding a “but you didn’t work, we were right to remove you” attitude, I feel as if I was able to sympathize more with him and his feelings of being betrayed by the team.

What wisdom do you take to heart?

At the end of the day, what you’ll take away from armies isn’t the sizes you’ve maxed, the wars you’ve fought, or the titles you bear. It’s the friends and memories that’ll stick with you, and define who you are.

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Veteran CSY has indefinitely struggled through things. From mastering the ability to stand right back up just like Spider Man to overcoming his own problems of stability is relatable to many penguins. If any bird takes anything with them, at least know the stressful part of armies isn’t to be what defines you; it’s the fun memories. Be sure to come back next week to hear more from your favorites and learn life-changing ideas!

What do YOU think of this edition? Will YOU take what CSY says to heart? Comment YOUR opinion down below!

PINK
CP Army Hub Associate Producer

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