Category: Self-Reflection (Page 6 of 7)
When you need a break from your busy, hectic life…you go away.
A break from the mundane means an adventurous holiday.
A break from the stresses of everyday life means a relaxing solitary holiday, lazing around on the beach.
A break can mean a bonding trip with friends and family.
A break means a break from your current life.
But what if you want a break from being yourself? Then where do you go?
Sometimes, I just want to be somebody else.
Grief is deceptive. It makes you think you are okay, and then it suddenly appears, out of nowhere and completely engulfs you.
Grief is two-faced. At times it allows you to happily reminisce, at others it immerses you in bittersweet memories and torments you, constantly whispering in your ear. “You will never see her again”, it says.
Grief is cruel. It sadistically places a black veil over your life, darkening all experiences.
Grief is relentless. It is there, lurking in the corner of the room you are in. You may busy yourself to ignore its presence, but it is always there, watching you.
Grief is condescending. It looks down on you and all of your past transgression and fills you with remorse.
Grief is isolating. It creates a pain that consumes you, so that the pain of others isn’t as important as it should be.
Grief is resilient. It doesn’t matter how hard you try to fight it, it does not go away.
Grief is mean. It robs you of happiness and fills you with emptiness.
Grief is merciless. It inflicts pain on innocent, good people. It does not heed anguish-laden calls to go away.
Grief is rude. It outstays its welcome. It bursts through the door unannounced and lingers until the very end.
Grief is remorseless. It feels nothing and cares not for the people it steamrolls over.
Grief is cowardly. It never confronts you, but attacks you from behind.
Grief is cunning. It strategically plans how to inflict maximum damage when you least expect it. It is the army of 1,000 gun-wielding maniacs that surrounds you and forces you to surrender.
Grief is conscienceless. It kicks you while you are down. It strikes after heartache and rubs salt into gaping wounds.
Grief is tyrannical. It cares not for your thoughts or feelings, but overpowers and overrules you. It has absolute authority over every atom of your being.
Grief is greedy. It has an insatiable appetite for pain. It infiltrates your entire body, saturating your cells and running through your veins.
Grief is impatient. It does not wait for shock to subside, but exposes its venom-laced fangs and strikes immediately.
Grief is inconsiderate. It is apathetic towards other circumstances in your life and overtakes you without a care for your other commitments.
Grief is indecisive. It can’t decide whether to stay or go, filling you with insecurity and anxiety.
Grief is indiscreet. It overrides your ability to smile and pretend that you are okay. It robs you of your ability to have a smile that reaches your eyes.
Grief is interfering. It listens into your conversations and interrupts mid-sentence.
Grief is jealous. It sabotages and suffocates happiness.
Grief is possessive. It monopolises your time, energy and emotions.
Grief is patronising. It makes you realise how insignificant and powerless you are.
Grief, I don’t like you. Please go away.
What is life without a little risk?
“Signing this document absolves this sky diving company from all responsibility in the case of any injury, including death.”
I re-read that a couple of times, took a deep breath and signed on the dotted line.
I’m most certainly one that lives on the edge. I don’t look before I leap (no pun intended) and I don’t consider the consequences. I blindly follow what my heart and mind (or sometimes either exclusively) tells me to do.
Wouldn’t life be boring otherwise? My mother, Asmi, bless her cotton socks, is a worrier. My father and I both joke that if mum didn’t have anything to worry about, then she’d worry about having nothing to worry about. Not only does she labour over every hypothetical outcome of the situation at hand, she will then analyse the hypothetical outcomes of the hypothetical outcomes of the situation at hand.
If mum’s worrying was translated into a maths equation, it would be along the lines of:
If x results in a or b or c and a results in d and e, b results in f and g and c results in h and i, where a is an almost certainty and b and c are highly unlikely to happen, should I do a, b, or c, and then should I do d, e, f, g, h or i?
Basically it’s a lot of variables that just don’t need to be there.
But I love my mum, I love her analytical mind, I love how she considers all possible outcomes and calculates risk.
When she went skydiving (because my mum is cool like that), I’m sure she checked her safety equipment 5 times before she jumped, was constantly aware of her altitude and released her parachute at exactly 1000m, or maybe 999m if she was having a bad day.
Me? I just jump. I am 0% foresight and 100% hindsight. I didn’t check my equipment. On the flight up, when asked what to do at 1000m, I said the only thing that popped into my mind. “Pray”. During the tandem skydive, when the instructor showed me his watch to indicate that the altitude was now 1000m and I needed to deploy the parachute, I just thought, “really? I’m falling from the sky and you’re telling me the time.” After he deployed the parachute (at 900m, after realising that I had forgotten to open that little thing that would save both of our lives), I realised why he was showing me his watch. Whoops.
This look-after-I-leap attitude has not served me well in some instances. Unknowingly taking the riskiest option has had some dire, painful outcomes. Then again, sometimes I’ve been lucky and they have paid off.
One of my uncles visited London and stayed with us.
“I always believed in balance. After meeting Mariya I realise that she is the yang to Asmi’s ying.”
I think he said that in jest, but in this context, he is 100% correct. Oftentimes I will hear my mum say “Don’t do that, if you do it then this will happen. Do this instead, it will be much better for you.” Every time, she was right. Conversely, there have been many times where I have said “Mum, you need to stop worrying about b, c, d, e, f….z, because a will happen. So stop caring about the rest!” I don’t have 100% success rate, but I’m still in training.
What is life without a little risk?
I think I need to work on mastering that part about “a little”.
And listen to my mother more.
My dad has epic taste in music; growing up I listened to Simon and Garfunkel, Peter, Paul and Mary, Bob Dylan, Bob Marley…music with meaning, music about the world, music that is hard to come by in today’s charts. Music that had profound meaning about life and love and philosophy and everything in between. I may not love Dylan’s voice, but I will never tire of reading his lyrics.
There was one song that I adored more than any other though – a song I used to jump on the bed to. A song I used to listen to over and over, back in the days when you had to rewind cassettes. I knew exactly how many seconds to hold down the rewind button to get to the beginning.
Today, these lyrics speak to me in volumes. It is a beautiful love song, and today I wish to sing this song to myself. I know, call me self indulgent 🙂
You with the sad eyes
Don’t be discouraged
Oh I realize
It’s hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small
But I see your true colours
Shining through
I see your true colours
And that’s why I love you
So don’t be afraid to let them show
Your true colours
True colours are beautiful,
Like a rainbow
Show me a smile then,
Don’t be unhappy, can’t remember
When I last saw you laughing
If this world makes you crazy
And you’ve taken all you can bear
You call me up
Because you know I’ll be there
And I’ll see your true colours
Shining through
I see your true colours
And that’s why I love you
So don’t be afraid to let them show
Your true colours
True colours are beautiful,
Like a rainbow
Today is five years to the day that I started work at Goldman. I look back, and it’s been an incredibly bumpy ride. Not so much professionally, but my personal life has taken so many twists and turns that at times, even I’ve had trouble keeping up!
I remember my first day like it was yesterday. I was an eager 22 year old who thought they had the whole world in front of them. I thought I had it all figured out. I was engaged, I had the job of my dreams and they had agreed to transfer me to New York. That was it. I knew exactly how my life would pan out, and I had already envisioned my white picket fence house in Long Island with green eyed husband and two kids.
A lot has changed since then. My naivety, although still there, is diminishing. I don’t have it all figured out, and I’ve learnt that even if I think I may, I still won’t have it all figured out. But I’m not worried, in fact I’m learning to accept that I don’t need to know how my life will end up. I’m happily enjoying the highs, and becoming stronger through the lows.
Where will I be in five years? Who knows. I don’t, and that doesn’t bother me one bit.