Vicissitudes

I had decided a while back that I'd like to try a new life somewhere before I'm 30.

But things never seemed to go the way I wished it to.

For awhile, I despaired. I wondered why everyone seemed so sure and so settled, yet I'm still floundering like a fish out of water.

Things were very difficult. I was getting very tired in my personal life, I was tired of fighting what always seemed inevitable....

I was also tired of the place I was living in, and I was looking to move out....

At work, my team was getting bullied, and so, slowly, one by one, they were all leaving... yet it seemed like I was the only one who was left behind.

And so I prayed.... I applied elsewhere, I sought guidance... I told My Lord... this is what I'm hoping for... but let Your Will be done... I put my life in Your gentle hands, I let myself be guided by Your Wisdom.... I know that You will let things happen, when You see fit, in Your time, not in mine.

Months passed. Things seemed to get from bad to worse.

Personally, I felt I was not going to wait for things to get better, I stopped fighting. I guess in a way, a part of me kind of died inside. And I let it die. I explained things, I tried what I can, but I suppose I stopped wondering. I stopped asking. I don't know if I stopped caring, perhaps I never will, but I stopped trying to take the burden of it on my shoulders.

I had my own life to live now. And so I decided I should live it.

I should celebrate life, so that if I should face death, I will have no regrets.

I spoke up at where I was staying. I said I was unhappy, I said I didn't wanna care so much anymore. I know one of them took offence, but I decided, if things don't change by May, I'd just leave this place behind me.

As for work, I had decided I'm looking elsewhere, but if there's nothing, I'd consider just resigning and going home for some re-assessment.

I asked for help. I sent my resumes here, there, anywhere I can get help.

I'm still seeing dragonflies. As many as two years ago again, and as consistently. I wondered if it's a sign, and I prayed again that He shall reveal Himself to me in His time and in His way.

And I got my answer. Last night, my prayer was answered. I have an offer. Quite good at that. In a neighbouring place....

I'm afraid, to be honest... It's not easy uprooting oneself and transplanting myself somewhere else. It's not easy giving up everything I've built for myself for 9 years here. It's not easy leaving my comfort zone.... but I felt I must. It's a push I have not felt for a long long time....

I asked for a sign, and it couldn't be clearer than this... Someone told me once: if you don't get something you asked for, don't despair, it just means that it's not meant for you, and God has a better plan for you.

Perhaps I'm ready now, and God wants me to go follow my heart.

I'm afraid, this may make or break everything. This may make or break me. I pray the Good Lord grants me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change... the courage to change the things that I can.... and the wisdom to know the difference....

I'm learning... to celebrate life....

Doubt as an Element of Faith

I remember talking to a friend in California who had lost touch with his faith in 2007. I remember him telling me about how he doesn't believe in his religion anymore. Although, when he was a lot younger, he used to be almost fanatical about Catholicism. 

I remember, how, as a child, I attended church camps, and one of the visiting priests had, during one Q&A session about our faith, discuss the mysteries of the church, and encouraged us to keep questioning ourselves, because that is the only way to lead us to the truth. It keeps us from getting complacent about our faith. And to avoid taking it for granted.

I remember how, at 16, my father insisted I tutored under a good old La Sallian brother, and how he had encouraged my writing, and allowed me to borrow from his personal library for free, with only one condition, to return them once I was done. And how, he too, indirectly, had encouraged me to learn by questioning.

WHY. Out of the 4W1H, it is the most important question. What Where When Why How. Why is always the most difficult to answer. Yet the most important. Because as what I had learnt from Psychology and Sociology in university, what motivates people is always the most elusive, and the most difficult to understand.

It requires you to get into the person's head, and into the person's shoes, and attempt walking a thousand steps in his shoes to attempt to glean even the most little understanding of what motivates him. And that is usually the most incomprehensible of all. People, in general, hate someone else questioning their motives. Common questions would be:

1. Don't you trust me?

2. Why must you know?

3. Isn't faith enough?

4. Why do you doubt me so?

5. Have a little faith in me, will you?

What most people fail to understand is that trying to find out the motivations of another person is always more painful than accepting the person at face value. It takes more effort. More tears. Because it means delving deeper than what is at the surface, than what is comfortable. What is readily shown to the rest of the world. People generally shy away from what appear to be painful or difficult, and uncomfortable, especially in today's era of self-gratification. No one wants to look like the bad guy.

It is always easier to accept when a person says: I'm like this. I'm just always bad-tempered. 

It's easier to accept that response and just stay at arm's length.

It's harder to ask: 'Why is he bad-tempered?' And to attempt finding out why and risking losing the person's friendship/ risking being yelled at/ etc.

Only if one perseveres, does a person find out that: Oh, he has an illness. He is constantly haemorrhaging. It leaves him tired and ill-tempered all the time. He needs help. He needs understanding.

It just goes to show how the extra effort that was being made can help spur understanding and forge a deeper relationship. How a little doubt can become an element of a deeper faith. The faith being the general goodness of people. That normally people do have a good reason when they're upset.

And yes, the above was a true example.

Like religion, accepting the general misconception that Catholics worship the Mother Mary, could have stopped me from finding out and having a deeper faith. And that doubt in said worship spurred me on to discover that it was not a worship, but a respect for her that started the Hail Marys. That the prayer was not one of worship, but of intercession. It meant: Intercede for me in my prayer to your Son. Help me bring my message to your Son, and to His Holy Father.

I don't claim to know everything about my religion. I'm just a baby in that aspect. But learning through questioning my faith, is a good start to keep me from being lazy.

Like every other aspects of my life, the question WHY has spurred me to greater heights than every other question. Where, When, What, How is easily deduced from most scenarios. But the question WHY is what has spearheaded all the greatest inventions and discoveries of our time.

The greatest example perhaps being: Why does the apple fall straight to the ground from the tree? The discovery of Gravity by Sir Isaac Newton. Which spearheaded many many other great scientific discoveries of the 20th and 21st century. Including space exploration.

The question WHY is what opens up our minds to the bigger possibilities out there. Keeps us from being a lazy bum and generally accepting our lot in life. It spurred the Enlightenment and the Renaissance movement. It started many a Revolution all around the world. It got us out of the Dark Ages.

WHY. I was raised to question. I was trained to ask the question. As a child born to science teachers. As a trained microbiologist and partially trained sonographer. WHY was the most important question.

The cells are not growing. WHY.

The child in the womb has a collapsed lung. WHY.

The question WHY can save relationships and, on an even more important scale, save lives. It's a question I cannot ignore, even if someone close to me dislikes the question the most.

WHY should not be a question that is feared. But one that is respected and cherished as a means to enhance our relationships and our lives. Whether that be our relationship with our parents, our siblings, our friends, our loved ones, our colleagues, nature, or even God. 

It enriches us. Challenges us to be better people. Humbles us as we question OUR OWN motivations. Spurs us to greater heights. Holds us to the ground as much as it exalts us to the sky. Keeps us open to other possibilities. Retains our enthusiasm for the people around us and for life itself.

As President Barack Obama puts it in his speech at Notre Dame: But remember too that the ultimate irony of faith is that it necessarily admits doubt. This doubt should not push us away from our faith. But it should humble us. It should temper our passions, and cause us to be wary of self-righteousness. It should compel us to remain open, and curious, and eager.

His speech was widely touted as one that redefined faith. Yet he wasn't the first man that had tried to tell the world this small kernel of wisdom. The priest at that church camp almost 15 years ago had said the same in less rhetoric terms. So did the good old La Sallian brother. So did Martin Luther, which sparked the revolution in the Catholic church, and sparked the Lutheran/ Presbysterian faith. It's one that wise men over the ages had tried to instill in a stubborn humanity.

But perhaps the radical young President's were the most rhetoric (as he is famous for), the most radical (for a country as secretly conservative, traditionalist, egotistical, selfish and narrow-minded as the United States of America) and the most unexpected. It was also perhaps, the most widely aired, and the most far-reaching, as most of the world is still running on the fever that is Obamamania. That may not be a bad thing. The young President may be shrewd and wise enough to utilise his high publicity to try and give the world a new perspective on the relationship between doubt and faith. And the great importance of the word WHY.

It may be what the US of A, and the rest of the world needs after all. Redefining Faith. Understanding the importance of the word WHY. Perhaps we would all start asking ourselves the most important question of all.

1. Why am I afraid?

2. Why am I behaving this way?

3. Why do I feel this way?

4. Why am I at this job?

5. Why am I with this person?

6. Why am I in this country?

7. Why am I limitting myself?

8. Why are we waging a war on terror?

9. Why do we call this the World Cup when it's only USA?

10. Why are we still polluting the earth?

and so it goes.

Doubt as an element of faith.... WHY do you think I am always questioning myself? And you?

Is it any wonder?

I have just returned from a dinner date with a collegemate I have not seen since 2001.

When we shared a dorm we were pretty tight until I moved out and we lost touch because I lost my phone.

So here I was having dinner and catching up with her and her roommate, L.

L had her concerns about how C was unreachable for almost two years, and asked her why.

Apparently she had fallen into depression. She had been dating a guy for about 2 years and they had almost gotten married. Bought a house together jointly. She was basically looking after all his affairs, paid for everything, even his phone bills. Even looked after his family.

Then he had an affair. Told different stories to different people. A cunning linguist, that one. Gave the other lady STDs. He had it from a previous girlfriend. Apparently he only confessed long after the relationship was over.

It was all very nasty and horrible. Even until now, after all her money was spent on lawyer's fees, it's still hard for her to regain all her losses on this wretch.

It's sad. Really. The mistakes smart women make over love. We've all been there, some stories worse than others.

I remember how mom and girlfriends always said it was better to marry someone who wasn't suave and sweet-talking. It's always better to marry someone who was a bad liar. Who was direct. Who didn't know how to pretend.

And how a girl always had more to lose. It's always important to protect one's assets. It's not unromantic. It's just.... self-preservation. Romance, sad to say, would have to take a backseat to practicality.

Perhaps this is why some women would rather marry into money.

Me, I figure considering the horror stories and the statistics, how sometimes, it's best to not marry at all. Being single has a ready escape clause. It's always easier to cut one's losses and run without a signed contract in between. Already, like C, she's already having so much trouble (even being single) to cut all ties because it's a case of 'Love and Affection'. What more if she had actually married this man?

Is it any wonder that so many of my year-mates who are good, smart, loving women capable of their own steady income and not intending to marry for money are single and have little intention to settle down, some being downright commitaphobics? We see and hear these cases with our own eyes and ears, many of them our own friends. And we help them pick up the pieces of their lives ruined by the wrong choice of men. We're there as a shoulder to cry on, we're there to offer support, we're there for opinion. We're there when everything crashes and burns.

Is it any wonder then, that we look at the crop of men around and wonder when they will grow up and take responsibility for their own lives, and the decisions that they make?

Is it any wonder then, that we figure if they're not ready to let go of their mothers' apron strings, that the rightful place for them is with their mothers?

Is it any wonder that most of us end up just pursuing our own careers and our own lives, and putting these first because it's a safety net that we know is more reliable? After all, we built them with our own hands. We got here with great effort, many mistakes, and great perseverence. We fought so hard to get to where we are, and are still fighting so hard to stay. And strangely, most of us are where we want to be. At 27/ 28. Finally. Career-wise, most of us are fairly satisfied with our day jobs.

But we're commitaphobes. I can count on one hand the batch-mates that married for love. 

Old maids, all of us. Maybe. Or perhaps, we'd just rather be alone than be unhappy.

Unless the men are worth our while... why bother wasting our fabulous selves on people who'd just make us miserable?

Being Human

If we knew when we were going to die, we'd do everything right the first time around. Because we knew we wouldn't have the chance to relive the moment again.

But being human, and being ignorant, we think there's always going to be a tomorrow. And another tomorrow. And yet another tomorrow.

And so it piles up. What we should do. What we want to do. The important things. The not-so-important things that become important things as the days and months and years fly by.

Until we realise one day, oh shit... where did the years go? What happened to the things I wanted to do, the things I should do, the people that had mattered to me?

So many hurts lie along the avenue of life. So many disappointments.

We live like we've got forever, but in truth, life is short. And precious. Why wait for tomorrow to say: I love you? Why let the fears hold us back from what we want to do? What we should do? Why let our pain keep us from trying new things? Keep us fenced in?

Why put off till tomorrow (and forever) what we can do today?

If we knew that we had just another 24 hours to live... will material possessions matter so much anymore? Will we want to spend at least 8 hours of it slaving at a job? Or will we start calling up everyone we care for to tell them we remember them, we cherish them in our hearts, we want them to know how much they mean to us, how we think of them when we're about to die. 

We go back to the arms of the people we love most. Because surely, on our deathbed, the last thing we would want to remember seeing are the faces of the people who mean the most to us. It would be a very sad thing, I think, to end up dying alone.

After all, in truth, when we leave this plane of existence, who cares that we leave behind a monument if there's no one to tell of it in the first place? What matters most, as a legacy, would be the memories we leave behind in the minds of the people who think of us.

The lives we touch. The people we leave behind. How they remember us. These would be our legacy.