My Remarkable CMA Journey
Claudine Jade B. Mata, CMA, CPA

Truly, the best things come when you least expect them to. My journey to CMA is really an unpremeditated and an unexpected one, but I cannot repudiate for a second that becoming the first SPCian to pass the Certified Management Accountant Examinations is one of the momentous and the most remarkable I have ever accomplished.

My voyage started when God sent an Angel in disguise granting me a scholarship for the CMA Program last December. It was an early Christmas gift from Him. At first I thought it was a hoax, but soon I realized that it was not, thus I grabbed it immediately.

Pressure hovered all around my whole being because I did not want to fail Sir Angel, the Director of Insights Financial Review Services, who approved assistance for the course. I gathered straightaway all review materials I could use for the exams together with the resources Insights provided me. It was Christmas Seasons and on Christmas Day itself, I was supposed to relax and enjoy, but I chose to linger with my pen and calculator, and train for the battle with them. The same was the scenario during the New Year’s Day. January made me as busy as a bee; I ought to attend review classes in Insights during Sundays where I needed to travel all the way from the province. I had a tough time dividing myself between school and review since I needed to be physically and mentally present in school activities, take term quizzes and exams, and accomplish the thesis which was the most time consuming of all. The bags under my eyes became luggages because of sleepless nights. The only side effect I loved was the loss of the flabs in my stomach which I kept for years.

My Part 1 exam schedule was on Feb. 21st. I was utterly devastated on that day, not because the exam was difficult. I was not allowed by Prometric Testing Center proctor to take the exam because, according to her, my IDs were “not acceptable”. Having appealed the matter to IMA, I was then permitted to take Part 2 on Feb. 26th. Unfortunately, rescheduling Part 1 became tough though, for no single date in the remaining days in February was available in Prometric Makati. The only option left was to fly and schedule it in Cebu. With the help of Insights, Part 1 Exam was rearranged in Cebu and I was able to take it.

Waiting for the results was the most heart throbbing times for me. I found Part 1 more difficult than Part 2, and I felt really uneasy about it. I kept on praying, and offering and writing requests in the Carmelite Monastery so that the Dear Sisters there would pray for me as well, believing that they are closer to God than I am. God didn’t fail me. He never did. All sacrifices and hard works pay off as I received the confirmation for passing both parts of the CMA Exams. It was like, “Hey I’m ready to die. Shoot a gun on me. Wait– NO! Not yet!” It was a mixture of contentment and anticipation. Hooray!

The road was not really a rough one for me. It was just deceiving due to the circumstances, but the fact isn’t. Maybe because I’ve got the best people behind who pushed me, supported me, motivated and inspired me to keep striving. I would like to take this opportunity to send my deepest gratitude to each of them.

First, my enormous thanks to Insights specifically to Sir Angel for believing in my capabilities, for granting me the scholarship, for providing all the materials I needed, and for assisting me all throughout this journey.

Second, I would like to show appreciation to San Pablo Colleges, its Board of Trustees, for the Academic Scholarship they have given believing that I deserve to enjoy its privileges. I was able to study and finish my degree in Accountancy for free almost. Thank you SPC for developing me as a total person.

Third, my acknowledgement to Dean Olivia Oabel and to all my Professors especially Sir Rene Belen for being so supportive and considerate when I failed to comply on time with your class requirements, and for allowing me to be excused in all classes due to the Examinations, for enriching my mind not only with the subject matter, but also with values and ideals.

Fourth, my huge thanks to my Family – my parents and siblings (particularly to Kenneth and Kristina) for taking care of me, for the love and assistance you have tendered.

Fifth, thanks to all my friends and classmates, mainly for the moments where you made me laugh and somehow forget the weights in life.

Next, my sincerest thanks to Alfredo Belen, Jr., for the love, care, and support you’re giving, for helping me in becoming prepared for the Exams in all aspects, and for the inspiration. Thank you for bringing out all the best in me.

I would also like to thank everyone who had prayed in behalf of me for the success of the Exams, and for believing and reminding me that I am capable of accomplishing it. I thank you for being certain that I am worthy for all these blessings.

And of course, the greatest thanks to the Lord our God, the provider of everything. Thank You Lord for all the blessings even though I know that I do not deserve most of these, for the wisdom, for Your guidance, for staying by my side, for listening and answering my prayers. You never fail me, Oh Lord despite my iniquities and shortcomings.

Someone always tells me, “Everything that has a beginning has an end.”, but let me just add, that for every ending is a new beginning. May this be a constant reminder to everyone, that no matter how sorrowful and devastating, or successful and prosperous the ending of each story in our life is, there is always a room to start over to correct the mistakes we have committed, to stand up and try again despite the failures, to improve ourselves by learning from our experiences, to aspire more and dream bigger, to achieve and accomplish our goals which are to be set higher, to continue the good deeds and not end them, but end those which made us uncomfortable and made us unworthy of ourselves and what we have, to never give up and lose hope, and to always have faith to the Lord our God. As quoted from Thomas A. Edison, “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”

My CMA Exams have just ended, and my collegiate days as I marched to get my College Diploma. My journey to this destination is not a smooth sailing one, as I doubt if there is any such thing. It will always be a mixture of sweetness and bitterness. But as it ends, another chapter of my life begins. Lies ahead of me are more challenges, trials, and hardships, but I know that this is just the perfect time to assimilate all learnings and knowledge I have gained for the last 20 years, in order to taste the sweetness of the success and great triumph God placed when He made the master plan of my life. I will never stop praising God for all His works. I know like Steve Rogers said to Bucky Barnes /The Winter Soldier, God is also saying, “I am with you ‘til the end of the line.”

Once again, I’m extending my appreciation and gratitude to God and to all the people who have been a part of my journey, and will always be. Thank you so much!

In The Face Of Strong Adversity

There are times when we believe we have on hand a good plan to achieve our aspirations in life. Just for the sake of hitting the mark, we prepare ourselves physically and emotionally, willing to do everything humanly possible, and apply every thinkable strategy to mitigate, if not obliterate, the possibility of failure. After all, who would like to fail?

Sometimes, though, what we dread most ends up happening anyway. Defeat stares upon us despite following our master plan with utmost diligence. Things go awry as we execute our plan. We’re left to wonder where we had gone wrong; what we could have done better that could have averted the negative result.

Indeed, earning the prestigious CPA title means confronting a worthy adversary. But if, in the face of strong adversity, we decide to surrender our position, feel daunted at the fear of failing once again, if we continue to focus our mind at the fear of receiving another failing score, years from now we will find ourselves being more disappointed by the things that we didn’t do than by the ones we did.

Setbacks happen every now and then in our personal lives, even in our quest for professional and career development. It’s part of every human’s very existence. Not being able to achieve our goals can tend to bring us down and lead us to think that everything we did was just a colossal waste of time.

If you’ve reached this point, there are but two ways your life could go, and it all depends on your attitude and how you accept this “hump”. You could view it as a total failure or as a sign that you shouldn’t have pursued your dream to become a CPA in the first place, which then make you give up on your goal altogether and train your sight somewhere else.

Otherwise, you could view it as an opportunity to learn and do better. As daunting as it may sound, the latter requires uncommon valor, and makes you summon every ounce of courage from inside of you. After all, it’s never easy to pick yourself up, and give it one more again.

Most people will just choose to withdraw, brood about their mistakes, and then stop trying again. Well, it’s the easy way out anyway. But if you’re truly set on achieving your goal, come strong wind and high waters, you will push forth, sail on, ‘til you cross the finish line.

Being able to handle temporary defeat is the key to becoming triumphant in this journey. Many candidates tend to feel utterly discouraged when they encounter setbacks, and allow a failed exam to consume all their energy and will to go forward. Of course, when we don’t achieve our goals, we tend to be plagued with self-doubt, thinking that we’re not good enough, that maybe we should stop our obsession to earn the CPA title.

Rather than seeing it as a failure or as something that puts an end to your hopes and dreams, look at it for what it truly is:  A mere temporary setback that should not hinder you from reaching for your goal. Run a self-check and do the following:

1. Recap what you did. This is a good way for you to see where you went wrong and what you should do better next time.

2. Accept that things didn’t go as expected, and move on. You could dwell on your problems and your mistakes, but that won’t change your situation or bring you any step closer to your goal.

3. Prepare better. This is an offshoot of #1. Once you know where you went wrong, you will be able to take appropriate measures to prevent foreseeable problems in the future.

4. Give yourself time to recover. You don’t have to go for your goals right away. You need time to gather your wits together, as you plan your next move.

Make no mistake. The CPA title is something not to be missed. When things don’t go according to plan, always remember that missed goals are not missed opportunities. Instead, they are opportunities to do things better on your next try.

Allow me to leave you with this inspiring quote:

“The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.” – Vince Lombardi

Never Too Late, Never Too Old
Learn to Lead

Do you know what Richard Branson’s greatest motivation is? It is “to keep challenging myself. I see life almost like one long university education that I never had—each day I am learning something new“.

Most people like to say that they’d like to do and experience everything that they can while they’re still young, insinuating that after a certain age it might be too late. This young generation of technocrats believes that people stop being motivated and creative as they reach middle age.

On the brighter side, this way of thinking can fuel your desire and determination to see and do everything possible while you still have the energy and will to excel at the early stages of your life. I personally know of one colleague who, after earning his baccalaureate degree in accounting and passing the Philippine CPA examination, immediately pursued the MBA course, then the CMA certificate thereafter. At the age of 25, he has a CPA, MBA and CMA title. If you think these are remarkable achievements, wait ’til you hear this other one. He completed his accounting degree and passed the Phil. CPA exam in 2011 at age 20. As family migrated to the U.S. he took and completed all four parts of the Uniform CPA examination last year. This June, he took Part 1 of the CMA examinations.

Sometimes, though, it makes you think that once you hit a certain age and you feel you still haven’t achieved anything in your professional career, you start to believe that you have pretty much failed and that you can’t do anything about it anymore.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of people out there who think that they’ve let so many chances pass by and that they already failed to grab any opportunities in life. Others also tend to adopt the idea that they’re just too old to try and learn anything new, and that whatever they know is sufficient. Thus, many of them just plod along without striving to be better at their jobs or in life, and without exploring any possible new opportunities that could improve their career. They just stop being enthusiastic anymore. Some people become complacent as they mature, and no longer have interest in learning current industry trends. I am glad I fought this off as I realized that even in mid-40s I could still motivate myself to pursue international certifications (CMA and U.S. CPA).

It is important for us to realize that age is indeed nothing more than a number. It doesn’t say anything about one’s ability to learn something new. It doesn’t restrict us from achieving. And it certainly shouldn’t be a barrier to how much we could change and how much better we could become. Opportunities should not just be restricted to younger people, after all. For “old-timers” (like the author), it is imperative that we recognize that having the right attitude and positive outlook in life is still the key factor to success. Equally so, being cautious should not be mistaken with looking at situations or opportunities negatively.

In addition, you want to stay relevant in your field, or at the very least be able to understand what other people are talking about. You don’t want to get left behind, and you certainly don’t want to become the kind of person who just looks on as new developments arise and are unable to get on board because you didn’t bother to learn new things. It is the ability to adapt and embrace change that can bring success to us as professionals.

So the next time you catch yourself thinking that you’re too old to try something new, take a course, or learn how to use a new gadget or software, stop and think for a few minutes. By merely contemplating to pursue a post-graduate course, or to upgrade your skills by enrolling in personality development training or seminars, these already are important indicators as these circumstances show that you still want to learn.

Don’t let others write you off just yet; prove you still can, despite your age.

Life After Conquest

Studying for the CPA examinations is kind of addictive. You may find yourself crawling in the first two weeks in to exam preparation, but as soon as you get your groove going you soon feel something’s lacking each time you do not open your FAR book in a rest day, or knock off a few Wiley exercises on AUD, or listen to your Ninja Audio on REG.

It’s been almost a month since I learned I passed REG, the final leg of my CPA journey. I want to share with you how more meaningful life has become after winning it back.

I had gone for a short stop to Manila in March 2013 to celebrate my victory with my mom, siblings, friends, and employees of our small public transport business, Pamana Transport Services. The feeling is just so consuming when you look back and think about how you had successfully overcome a worthy adversary. Every ounce of sacrifice that I have invested in this journey is truly gratified, with hefty dividend paid in full.

One of my immediate plans is to start writing a book on Financial and Management Accounting and, hopefully, to release it toward the middle of next year. Indeed, life’s opportunities just become too manifest after a professional’s conquest of the CPA title. I have earned my Philippine CPA license more than two decades ago, but having the U.S. CPA title tucked under my belt just takes everything to a whole new level.

From the time I first joined Another71.com as a Ninja candidate way back in 2011 I have seen several Ninja posts shouting at the top of their lungs how jubilant they were upon completing their own CPA journeys, yet oddly asking how they’d now spend loads of their spare time previously allotted to studying. To be honest, my first impression was that these Ninjas were just being plain “arrogant”. Surely, they could always go back to doing what they used to be doing previously was what I thought was just pure logic. They could go back to being the loving, caring dad that they used to, or the wife or mom who consistently takes good care of her husband and kids on a full time scale.

If you’re not among the extraordinary CPA candidates who breezed past the CPA journey in just less than 6 months, chances are you will be able to relate to what I’ll be talking about.

CPA candidates on the average take about 12-24 months to complete the CPA journey. Yes, the often rocky road to success requires you to focus your whole being to studying that long to be able to reach your destination. Deviate from this even for a little and you expose yourself to receiving some heart-breaking 74s and discouraging 60s. And so, all for the sake of conquering this monster we learn how to say no when our kids ask us to play chess or badminton with them.

For a long while I thought I had fallen in love once again, not to a woman thank goodness, but to something known in this community as “CPA”. I knew I was “in the groove” when all I thought about then was studying for my next exam; when nothing else mattered anymore but passing.

When even in deep slumber you could hear Ninja Audios reverberating like a cool sound of morning dew, you are definitely on your way to your CPA.

Then, come the day of emancipation. Freedom. Sheer radiance at the end of the tunnel. Just as any CPA candidate had always looked forward to. Yet you suddenly find yourself disconcerted, confused with mixed feelings.

So, what is life after conquest? Without sounding negative, things will never be the same again. The things that you do and had grown living during your journey will linger on. Whatever it is that you continue doing afterwards is a matter of preference. I chose to continue listening to my REG audio because I didn’t want to lose this precious knowledge about federal taxation that I have already acquired. I still try to knock off about 20 MCQs twice a week for, honestly, how many of you REG passers do still remember the intricate rules on “basis of partner’s interest”?

On the personal aspect of things I am so thankful because my CPA journey has taught me how to reflect on the real value of spending time with the true VIPs of my life: My wife and my children. I missed a lot of quality play time with my kids for almost two years, but now can enjoy life to the fullest by redirecting all my spared energy to the very same people who supported and inspired me in each battle.

After CPA, life is truly no longer the same, because this journey do not only teach us become better accountants but, more importantly, make us become better persons.