Hopeless

I was lying in bed all morning, unable to make myself get up. Every time I convinced myself to try I'd then stop in my tracks, my mind drawing a big fat blank as to why I needed to get up. Yeah, why do I need to do anything at all, what's the point?

Why even write these words?

I know all the bullshit answers that are supposed to be motivational or make you feel good. They all sound lovely to the ear, for sure. More importantly, they're all what you're expected to think and say to one another like good little members of an increasingly hypocritical world that cares only about the image it projects without having any real substance behind.

So I was turning and tossing in bed, unwilling to do anything except sleep the day away... I wondered how come I'm no longer able to work on stories I used to love writing. And then it hit me like a thousand bricks on the head: since I've lost any strive for success and have ceased to exist according to the validation of others I have lost any sense of reason to do anything at all.

It's not depression, far from it. I'm fighting a state most people will always remain blissfully ignorant of for their whole existence - I'm staring at what happens when you no longer are, think, or do anything based on others and the need for their validation to feel like you exist. This illusion-based need to have others' attention and validation is what fuels most of our urges to do anything beyond meeting basic needs (basic needs being fuelled by primal/survival instincts).

Remove the need for others' attention and validation and suddenly whenever you get the idea of doing anything at all it is met by a sarcastic - but lucid - inner voice that asks : what the hell for?
Ultimately, whatever we achieve as human beings beyond surviving is driven by the presence of other fellow humans, more widely called 'society'. When a society is crumbling and its very fabric is being dissolved then I can only venture that some people are more prone to see it than others and that the very ability to see it leads to that state I'm in and which leaves me observing the world with no longer any urge to ever take part in it again because somewhere down the line it felt too much like staring at something I am not and never will be.

Add to that the fact that I really don't like the world I live in and the directions it is taking, how it is making the majority of people become consumption-driven human drones, how truths and even knowledge are constantly manipulated, distorted or hidden according to the fake humanist/democratic ideology imposed on the whole world one country after another,  how the fact that we are now so many billions is making it easier to encourage intense competition and the need for most to sell themselves shamelessly in the name of 'success' and money to supposedly 'stand out' and how, ultimately, the only ones really benefiting the most from such conditions remain the exact same ruling classes as ever - the same types, the exact same ones only rebranded to blend in or be perceived as cool or simply hiding behind the faceless entities that are corporations allowed to grow to such monstrous magnitude, swallowing everything else in their wake to suck up the life of us all.

Queen once asked "who wants to live forever' but I think the question should really be: "who wants to live in such a world?"

More to the point, unless I find a new source to fuel any action I may take in life I'll be left in a state similar to  inertia, which would not be good.

Fugue

Something about the way I perceived Reality has been fractured, broken away, eroded, shattered. Patterns I started to glimpse became more and more obvious, and yet I could rarely make sense of them no matter how hard I tried. I would become too focused on trying to make perfect sense of everything - absolutely every single detail.

It all culminated in my decision to go to Peru for a few weeks. There I became further involved in the mystery I like to call the 'kindness of strangers' - a lesson I haven't yet fully processed for myself but that involves receiving unexpected help or acts of kindness from complete strangers crossing my path seemingly only long enough to offer very specific help, guidance, or simple kindness. And so all the patterns that connect every dot within my own life are becoming this ever-interconnected cosmos of their own, somehow, where everything is nothing and nothing is everything... where chaos is order as much as order is chaos. Where the threads are the same even if the image looks different.

Beside dwelling further on the kindness of strangers I also realised I could have died but I didn't realise that fully until a doctor pointed that fact out to me. There I'd been, standing on top of mountains, worrying about altitude sickness and the nasty bout of flu I'd caught, determined as I was to reach Machu Picchu... yet all along the one thing that could have killed me in the night was the wrong medication I'd been given and to which I was allergic. Doc said: "You were very lucky to escape with only a rash..." Yes, especially in the middle of a trek in the Andes.

But all this seems to vanish into the background of existence in general when I stop for a moment to connect the dots - circumstances, lessons learned along the way through mistakes, people or strangers met on the way, words exchanged, chance encounters, missed opportunities and those that just seem to pop up out of nowhere... It's not about whether there is meaning or sense, or even some 'plan' in the endless chains of events or not, it's about the fact that as they unfold they always seem to allow for further growth - or lack thereof - as part of a continuous process that goes on for at least as long as one is alive.

Thinking about the 'kindness of strangers' makes me wonder about my own self, and how perhaps the world or 'universe' is somehow showing me through these strangers a better way of projecting myself when it comes to dealing with other people... because let's face it, I've never really been good in terms of human relations. I used to dream of Love and Friendship but all I knew was based on imagination and fantasy, and in reality I had never learned to love. It's hard to explain. I've always been so self-involved, so very focused on my inner world and thoughts that the rest of the world became a stranger I failed to relate to - but only because I let myself grow increasingly cut off from the source.

It's been a strange, eventful year... but it wasn't all the travelling that made much of a difference in the end because by the time I was on to trip number 4 or 5 I'd already grown more aware of the fact that Beauty, or what some may call a 'heightened sense of perfection', can be found anywhere in life... it just depends on the perspective or angle we take or that we choose to adopt. Perhaps the same goes for Reality itself as well as people and how they (but also our own self) manifest themselves, and perhaps if I understand the deeper ramifications of such things - namely that I am the master of a reality in which the universe I seem to experience outside of me is but a direct response to my own reflection/ways of manifesting myself - then I can hope to reach something far more meaningful than so-called happiness or fulfilment in material terms.

Maybe I'm just dreaming again. But then again maybe the universe as a whole is really like an ever-expanding elastic band we can choose to neglect, keeping it forever twisted on itself in a knot, or to stretch out with both hands to see just how much it/we can grow.

Meander of Thoughts

Do we exist outside the gaze of others? We can try, but if there is no one else to validate our actions, thoughts or mere existence can we still maintain a sufficient degree of care and self-consciousness to continue behaving like humans?

I remember being in high school and having to write a dissertation on a question just like that for my philosophy class. I also remember getting the highest grade. Shame I don't remember my arguments so well now. Back then I was far better at focusing my thoughts and I could delve into topics with such depths and yet without much effort at all... it was like a flowing river, no big deal. But as time goes by the mind seems to get increasingly cluttered, and then memories grow fuzzier to the point where one is left to wonder if what they remember is really down to what happened in the past or mere imaginations.

Last night I was reminded of the all elusive and ephemeral aspect of 'memories'. I found myself reading back a page written in French a few years back that told the beginning of my own story as I moved countries as a teen. All the detail contained in that one little page was what struck me. It was so sincere, so simple, so... authentic. It was a perfect example of a piece of writing that had truly come from my heart, from me. I finished reading the page and my heart hurt with regrets, tears swelling in my eyes as I thought to myself: "Why did I stop there? Why didn't I keep going with this story?..."
It was written so long ago, at a time when my memories were still fresh, all of them retaining the depth of thoughts and feelings, the touch, the smells, the sights and even the sounds... all of it was more or less captured within my mind and heart and had allowed me to translate it into words on paper/screen. But at the time for some reason I could not go on. It felt too raw, too recent or 'close' to my person, and I naively told myself that in time, some day, I would feel 'ready' to write that story..

Well, 12 years have passed and last night I realised that all those precious memories I believed would always be engraved in my mind have all but vanished for the most part. All the precious detail, the trivial things that could be dismissed as insignificant in daily life but that instil life and depth into a story - authenticity and emotions - most of it is gone, leaving me clutching at vague recollections of events or moments stripped bare and rendered useless, empty, vapid... 

O Memories, why have you betrayed me so?

As I lay in bed last night, haunted by that realisation and unable to stop the ruthless work of Time as the memory snatcher that it is, I tossed and turned, sobbed and sighed... 

"It was all in vain!" shouted my mind from within, twisting the knife further into my heart. "All in vain!..."

And then I propped myself up on on elbow, startled by a new line of thoughts that had suddenly gripped my mind as I sobbed over the pointlessness of it all. It was about life in general, and then Love, and what an intrinsically unattainable ideal it really seemed to be ultimately. Most of us spend our lives getting attached (biological/instinct based)and being social (herd-like behaviour and needs)- neither of which is love.

Christians are often mocked for basing their religion/faith solely on love. Many a time a non-believer will say things like: "Is that all, eh? That' just too easy and convenient" , and the same mocking tone might be taken when told that asking for forgiveness is all that it takes for anyone in the wrong to be forgiven. But to be truly repentant is no simplistic affair or the matter of just putting a fake smile on one's lips. It is one of the hardest things, because it requires feeling the weight and torture of a conscience first.  As for Love...  the ability to love seems to be the rarest thing, and the ability to nurture and preserve that feeling is even rarer. 

Watching Death

Almost two years ago I had to look after a hamster, and though it was supposed to be temporary the little creature ended up living with me permanently. I decided to call him Charlie. In many ways I liked watching him roll blindly in his ball because watching him was like watching people going about their daily business with such a deep air of oblivion about them.

Anyway, Charlie the hamster has been very sick these past couple of weeks and his sickness has now taken a turn for the worst. It’s funny how he’d always seemed more or less fine, and even when we got worried at times for his health for one reason or other, I realise now how fine and healthy he was then compared to that invisible veil of death I can sense floating about him now… one moment he was full of life, the next you could just tell… it just showed at once - death looming, like a ghost creeping up on the poor little creature.

I was watching him last night and this morning as he lay panting and lethargic, and it was like watching the ultimate struggle between whatever you want to call that ‘spark’ of life that animates all living creatures and the mere shell of a body, the vessel for that spark… and as that vessel breaks down, breaks away from its helm, it is like watching Charlie’s spark making one last stand before leaving or vacating that vessel for good… it doesn’t really feel like that spark is about to switch off to nothingness at once but more like it is about to leave, jump ship - vacating what will soon be no more than a corpse that will eventually turn to dust. And though I am writing about a little creature, isn't it the exact same fate that awaits even the most powerful of humans? Perhaps the tears I feel swelling in my eyes are down to that stark reminder courtesy of Charlie’s sickness.

I am reminded of the inexorable passing of time, of this invisible ticking clock far grander than any man-made one, of this pendulum whose dance can never be tampered with, of the ultimate hourglass whose sand once passed never gets a second chance. All this I am reminded of just watching little Charlie… I am then reminded of my greatest fears, which have always included the fear of loss, and this I have felt since I was very little. I suppose I felt it the moment I was able to understand the fact that I only had one person in my life that truly cared about and knew me - my mother. Once I understood just how potentially alone I was in this world, that I had no one other than her, the seed of fear when it comes to loss took hold at once. The biggest tale-tell sign of a child afraid of loss (to an unhealthy extent) may well be his or her attempts at taming that fear while still quite young. I remember imagining and playing out scenes where I was told that my mother had died, and I would imagine how the police would come knock on the door to let me know - and then, as I was playing the scene real, heavy tears of pain and sorrow would roll down my cheeks… I wasn’t just playing out some imaginary scene, I was really living it on an emotional level.

I find myself checking on Charlie several times a day... I see the intense tiredness weighing like a ton of lead on his tiny body now deformed by whatever sickness that’s killing him, and I can sense what it must feel like right towards the end when the wariness spawned by a constant crescendo of pain and the weight of heavy eyelids drunk on exhaustion all lead to the increasingly overwhelming urge to let go in favour of just ‘sleep’… a drifting into oblivion that knows no returns, inescapable some day. So I watch that little furry animal dying away day after day and it reminds me of the Living condition as a whole and how in the end it’s the same for all of us, whether we are humans or mere critters - once the vessel gives out, whatever it is that animated it has to vacate the premises for good. I guess I’m dreading the contrast that’s to come at some point in the near future between the sight of a very living animal and that of his irreversibly lifeless corpse… The contrast that shows you point-blank and without preamble just how unfathomable and irreversible - how deserting - Death is in essence. One moment there is life, the next it can go out just like a candle’s flame blown out by the wind.

And so I watch him huddled in one corner, unable to open his eyes anymore. From time to time he shifts, slowly and painfully, from one trembling side to the other, eyes now forever closed - and I keep thinking: he is about to leave the same way he came into this world, weak, blind and powerless. Naked, stripped of all strength... but the will to live is truly the last one to go - until the very last moment that will remains, till the vessel is just too broken and not even the will to live can put off the end.

In some parts of the world death is as much a part of life as a newborn’s first breath. Though its implacable hand is revered and feared at once there is a certain sense of acceptance Man learns to nurture along the way - a strange acceptance based on striking a balance between what manages to live and what must unfortunately leave. But to me the most striking part of death is the contrast between one moment - full of life and vitality - and the next as I am made to stare into emptiness, a vacant vessel.

Urban hermit

I find myself not having much to say anymore... it's not like I've stopped thinking 'too much', it's just that every time I attempt to put these thoughts into words I'm struck by the fact that I can never express more than a mere fraction of a bigger whole. It doesn't matter what the thought, idea or theory is about - it can never humanly be expressed in its entirety (in the most depth) because language itself in all its limitations prevents the expression of all the factors, intricacies and other numerous shades of reason involved and needing to be expressed at once for that one single thought, idea or theory to be perfectly whole, complete. What can I say... this realisation is increasingly leading me to favour silence.

And who knows, perhaps it is better to keep silent than forever taking part in incomplete utterance or exchanges of thoughts, understanding and knowledge.

These days I've reverted back to what I like to call a 'sponge state' whereby I'll spend my time soaking up knowledge, influences and experiences through books and research involving minimal social interaction... some might say 'urban hermit' would be a more accurate term to describe my current condition, and I suspect such a state of being or 'lifestyle' isn't such a rarity in cities nowadays. I'm not avoiding interaction with others as such, but will avoid it or at least aim to keep it to a minimum if given the choice.

Why?

Well, part of the reason is similar to a person fasting to cleanse the body. I need to keep away from social interaction to get a clearer sight of myself away from the tremendous amount of modern pressures and expectations. The moment I step into the streets, for instance, I am at once reminded of those pressures as though they had the power to permeate the air itself. Inside my head it feels too much like a million voices are  shouting at once, figuratively speaking - I am extremely self-conscious and therefore the presence of others acts as a terrible drain on my person. I have grown so sensitive to a certain sense of others' consciousness (because of my own heightened self-consciousness, I suppose) that I'll even find myself thinking of a particular person right before they manifest themselves in my life through, say, a phone call or email. If that sounds fun, well it isn't. It is the most emotionally draining 'sense' one could imagine. I find myself pushing that strange sense of awareness linked to others more often than not - pushing it out of me, rejecting it with all my might because otherwise it feels like white noise inside my head, so to speak.

And so in time I found that the more socially involved I was, the more that 'white noise' (spawned by my own unhealthily intense self-consciousness) grew. Similarly, the more I withdraw from social interaction, the quieter, clearer and more peaceful my mind grows.

Perhaps this time of relative social isolation has its purpose - I am much like the convalescent mind, but I could not find out the source of the ill, let alone attempt to cure it, if I remain immerse in the constant noise made not by a community in which I have roots, but a world at large from which I am mostly disconnected in essence.

But then when I think about notions like purpose, I am reminded of just how much better silence is when it comes to trying to explain just how pointless the quest for purpose really is to mankind. By wanting to have a so-called purpose or goal we actually strive towards the basic, primitive animal condition since all other creatures exist solely under Nature's clockwork dictate, each existing with precise, imposed goals to fulfil (mostly defined by so-called basic needs/survival instincts). If you think about it, by shaking our heads in despair, crying: "Oh dear, what is the point of life? What am I meant to do with my life? What is my purpose?!" we are not seeing that having no purpose is what frees us, as crazy as that may sound. It's only the primitive little chimp in us that gets scared of the idea... What this really means or what the ramifications are on a greater scale, I just don't know.

Between a loch and a forest

Only this morning I was getting lost in the depths of the Scottish forest... Between a hazy sea of green pastures, tall pines reaching for the foggy skies, and the brown smudge of rolling hills in the distance slithered away the mighty Loch Ness - but I never got a glimpse of the monster (except in my head).

I walked for miles under the glaring cover of clouds and rejoiced every time the gloom was stretched open for a moment to let the sunshine out into the valley, illuminating the sky and the swift-running streams cascading down below into the lazy meanders of a giant lake. With every step I took, it felt as though I was reaching out deeper into a whole other world... a fantasy, a dream...

At some point I reached a forest that looked dead in the clutches of a thick mist, with all the trees stretching towards the sky, their branches akin to naked, twisted arms painfully thrown upwards.

The moaning, screeching and cracking of their limbs in the gusty wind added to the air of gloom that weighed on the forest and I found myself hurrying away, throwing frightened glances around just in case some mischievous creature were to jump at me from the cover of these scarily naked trees.



Nothing happened.

Soon enough, I had reached the Shores of Nowhere where white pebbles shimmer even under the weight of thundery skies. I sat down on a rock by the lazy water that came in waves to caress my feet and stared at the procession of thick clouds gathering further into the horizon.


And then I got back on my feet, climbed a mountain, skipping for a while like a small child along a winding little path that snaked its way between thick bushes speckled with wild flowers and towering pines... gazed at the world down below from so far above, got soaked by a bout of torrential rain, jumped over puddles and streaks of mud, climbed atop small rocky hills on the way, whistled at the birds hiding high in the mighty trees, sung to myself nursery rhymes and various other songs that came to mind... and all the while there was no other around but me, as though I had truly entered another realm... that of ancient myths and legends... and as I walked, and walked, I felt free.

I think I'm getting addicted to long, strenuous walks. They have so far proved the only thing that helps soothe what some choose to call the 'restlessness' of the soul.

Ruminations

I'd almost forgotten one of the rare good scenes in the 'modern' StarWars trilogy telling the ill-fated story of Anakin Skywalker before he turned into Darth Vader. The scene above, along with the music, manages to capture superbly the fateful moment that leads the hero to his own downfall while at the same time showing how everything that unfolds next hinges on one single decision.

We seem to take decisions everyday, from what time we should get up or what we should have for lunch to what school we should send our kids to or if we should even settle down and have kids at all.
But most decisions are influenced by an array of factors already at play that are likely to push us into one particular choice whether we're aware of those factors or not.

In more ways than one, Life is like a narrowing road winding its way into the distance. The moment we get born is arguably when the person's life choices (or 'realm of possibilities') are at their largest, but as the person grows older and an increasing number of internal and external factors are added on along the way, that road narrows down to a thinner and thinner path with less and less room for options to make any turn at all. And as this Life road becomes thinner over time, leaving the person increasingly stuck walking on a thin thread leaving next to no room for anything except walking on ahead, the variety of choices and the dreams or aspirations the person once had dwindle down to obscurity.

I personally like to keep my realm of possibilities as wide as possible, meaning that to this day my Life's road remains much wider than a lot of people out there. One of the biggest downsides in this is that walking along a wider road leaves you prone to getting stuck wandering blindly in circles without even noticing it. I should know for I seem to have got stuck in those circles several times already. And maybe every time I think I've emerged from one it's only to fall straight back into another one.

But what's worse? Walking down a thinning path with blinkers on, or leaving the path wide enough to take the risk of getting lost?

For what it's worth, I don't think I'm getting it. I'm not getting the point... Again, it's like having something right in front of you and not being able to see it. Like searching for a watch everywhere for days only to realise it was sitting in plain sight on your desk all along.

Writer's Block Part II

I feel like a puppet whose strings have been severed, leaving my body slumping to the ground deep below like a broken rag doll... floating away into a netherworld stretching between two realms - society's version of Reality and Reality itself.

I have been made to question whether there is such a thing as too much realism. I went from being intrinsically abstract, idealistic, dreamy and introspective to this person I am now and who I do not know what to make of. I have actually changed so much in the space of 3 years that I can no longer relate to what I wrote in the past, be it in thoughts or in fictional writing. I can't lie to myself, nor can I hide from the fact that I have changed because the writer's block stems from that.

I stare at all my past writings, endlessly wondering: "So that's it, then? All of this never meant anything...It was never me..." Does this mean I might as well burn it all? If I can no longer relate to my writings then it was never really me, or rather it never tapped into the core of I - because if it had, then it would feel more constant and I would still be able to relate no matter how much I changes around the periphery of that core.

Travelling down the river Styx, hopeless shadow of what I once was,

I remember a little girl who would have been good.

I remember the one that should have been and stare at the fraud that took her place,

Reflected in the dark waters of Nowhere.

(Pre-Dive into the Void, Aug. 2006)

If life is about completing 'circles' then this time I may be found leaning over the little boat as I reach out with my hand towards the reflection staring back at me. Whether this move makes the little boat capsize remains to be seen, but even if it does and I find myself drowning, so what?

We cannot 'find' ourselves for there never was anything lost and needing to be found in the first place - everything was always there, but we may not always have been able to see it. If I cannot see then I must train my eyes, inside and out.

I really am pulling a Santiago...

Writer's Block

These days I feel like picking up a bag, throw that bag over my shoulders and walk out the door. Where to? nowhere, everywhere... Just walking. Walking, walking, walking... into the distance, from sunrise to sunset. What a sublime vanishing act this would be.

Words are stuck inside my head like an old chewing gum stuck under a seat. How much more vivid can you get?

So many young people travelling the world these days... but I can never quite shake the feeling that the only reason I want to travel is this search for that all-elusive clarity within, and sometimes just so I could escape my own self. And it doesn't work. It could never work. How could it? You can't 'find' yourself no matter where you go. If you couldn't 'find' yourself right where you are now, you won't 'find' yourself even on top of the highest mountain in the world. Everything, every answer, every solution, every meaning that is ever created, it's all already there and there is nothing to be found because it was always there.

So why can't we see it? Why can't I see it? What is this 'everything that was always there' that I keep searching for as though it needs to be found?

When words are stuck, there's always the use of colours. I've just sort of finished my copy of a Van Gogh but I messed up the patterns on the church's windows. Oh well.

Looking around in my bedroom, what do I see? There is a scattering of old paintings I copied as a teenager - a clumsy rendition of Monet's La Liseuse, a more successful attempt at reproducing one of his winter landscapes (The Magpie), a pencil drawing of Paris' Sacré Coeur next to a sketch of Manet's Venice painting, all of this surrounded by postcards stuck on the wall with blue tack; George Stubbs' Whistlejacket, a few of Turner's fiery seas, Renoir's Lakeside Landscape, and even a still life by Courbet. On the other side and right above the first of two bookshelves stands a copy of Van Gogh's Sunflowers I painted over a decade ago. Further on a copy of Monet's Impression, Sunrise next to a calendar depicting the Lake District and a poster of an old fashioned red double decker bus with the Houses of Parliament in the background. Turn around from there and you will find the writer's desk, full of junk, crunched-up paper, a small stereo, not one but two printers, a messy pile of books, candles, a phone, some hand cream, a few empty cups of tea or coffee, a notepad, a laptop on which I am typing, a scattering of pocket-size flashdrives, and then in one tiny corner right beside the window... three photographs. One of a crystal blue lake nestled between snowy mounts, one of my cat lying across piles of papers scribbled all over, and a tiny picture of my old black cat.

You do not want to look down at the floor where canvas, paints and brushes sit together in a tangle right now. The bed is a knot of sheets, really, and on one of the pillows rests a copy of Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov which I started reading yesterday.

I cannot find myself anywhere but wherever I'm at. What is it that I am not seeing? This urge or longing for far away reaches, the need to walk, and walk, and walk... it is an illusion. Or perhaps I do need to go on a long walking pilgrimage of sorts where I would walk, and walk, and I would not stop until complete physical exhaustion to get rid of the surplus of inner energy. 

If there is nothing to be found, and if everything was always there then why, oh why can I not see it?

Retour aux sources

To have the freedom to do as we please isn't freedom, but to do what we love is. I'd almost forgotten how peaceful and settling it was for me to structure my day fully around the arts. It always feels like home... immersing myself in music while painting, and then immersing myself in writing, without forgetting to lose myself in research - and that research can vary from reading the dictionary for hours in search of new words and turns of phrases, to analysing novels (paying careful attention to other writers' way with words, devices used and style) or simply getting stuck in random books according to what I need to describe in a story. I've been known to borrow books from the library on trees, flowers, architecture, clothing and even carpentry just to get the vocabulary and feel to it just 'right'.
And these things aren't chores, they're the most wonderful pastimes one could have - at least to me. By the time I'm done doing all this throughout the day, it's already night time. But I stopped doing all this years ago as life got in the way. Of course, Life always gets in the way. But the truth is that part of me, no matter how much I knew what I loved, always seemed intent on letting herself be distracted. It's like... knowing exactly where home and fulfilment is and yet like a revolted child choose to wander away in defiance. And that I have done so much that today I realised how much time had passed away from 'home'.

Hesitantly, I retrieved the dusty brushes and paints from their dark corner, sat down on the floor, took a deep breath and... I started painting again. I thought to myself: "I'm so rusty..." The fact is, I haven't painted in almost 8 years. I decided to try my hand with one of my unfinished copies of masters (which I never dutifully copied to the letter). Before I stopped painting completely, I had started on two very different styles: one was a Monet, the other a Van Gogh. I decided to get back in the swing of things with Van Gogh, and my... I'd forgotten how special it was to try and copy his works. You can't be gentle, and you certainly can't be shy when it comes to the amount of paint needed. I started off shy, though, and then slowly my hand loosened its stiffness and I began to feel the same way painting had always made me feel - free to feel the colours, almost like entering some sort of strange trance where the mixing of colours becomes a quest to find the exact one needed... a ritual in itself where the brush is dancing and twirling from the wooden palette to the canvas. And you can't see the result at once! Oh no, you can't. You have to keep at it with the utmost sense of raw passion awakening within but contained in the bursts of colours dancing for you.

I have to admit I am no 'real' painter, but the art itself has always tapped right into the core of my emotions - the colours.

After my frantic dance with colours, I went to wash away the paint on my fingers and sat back down to focus on the writing, just letting it flow and seeing where it'd take me. No need to rush, I am very rusty. Alone in the house, with only myself and the burning passion within no longer distracted by the outside world, I immerse myself in my own bubble and forget everything and everyone. And that is I.

Unfinished business... and far from complete!

I spent the day watching childhood cartoons - well, Japanese animé to be more precise. It's got to be better than watching the news. My head is still spinning from recent unfolding events and my emotions are still raw, and I feel mostly like curling into a ball in my bed.

"He who acquires his skills quickly is the first to perish."

(says villain in Japanese animé)

They always say at least we learn from our mistakes - but what happens when you never actually learn and are stuck in a never ending loop? I asked that question to a friend the other day after she said 'I'd learn from my mistakes' as though it were a fact, and she wasn't able to answer. "Learning from our mistakes" sounds like such great advice... until you personally realise that you're not learning at all, and then you realise that these so-called pearls of wisdom are but mere platitudes with no real substance to them.

The more I listen to people around me, the more I realise how much these platitudes fill the depths of their thoughts, like a life-long collection of what ought to sound good to the ear.

Well, falling free from the chains that bind you is painful.It's like punishment for refusing to play the game and right now I'm mostly busy licking my battle wounds. I can't indulge in that healing process for too long, unless I want to fall into a pointless cycle of depression and self-pity. The way events unfolded is what hurt me - not the outcome itself. The outcome is great. It's called the absolute unknown. It's the scariest but most exciting situation to find yourself in.

This song is for the world

I've burned my wings again. I don't know how many more pairs I get to have in this life, but I'll keep flying too close to the sun and burn them. Nothing else better to do. Try explaining that to 'people'.

I am just this little person, lost in the midst of billions - so why, oh why, do I always stand out? What is it about me that makes people obsessive (always in a bad way)? It's like they see this... novelty... and won't give up on it till they've broken it?

Everywhere I fucking go, everything I fucking do - everything... People, society... it's like a leech on your leg, or a rabid dog refusing to let go no matter how much you shake that leg. Sucking out the life, the energy, the enthusiasm for life, out of you.

Why is it I should have a 'plan'? Why should I quit a job just to have another? Why should I be obsessed over the notion of a career? I never gave a crap about all this. I don't want ANYTHING. I don't want ANYTHING.

I do not strive towards ANYTHING except my own self. And truth. Genuine emotions, genuine exchanges, genuine action. Yes, that I understand - everything else is false.

People need a direction, they need a reason, they need a purpose. I don't. I never will. I am free.

You think you need to have a job, a title, a place somewhere... Good for you. I am happy simply being 'aware'. Everything else to me is just bullshit.

Ask me questions, you're more likely to get crap out of me. I have nothing to say. I think, I try, I do my best. What else does this crazy world want for me? If it's my soul, I'm sorry to say: NO.

Rising Skies

When the free fall is in sight, it may be better to look up and see that the red skies are rising.

I haven’t woken up before dawn in a long while, when the skies are still dark and the air so fresh with this unmistakable taste of human quietness overwhelming the senses. No other time of day has that scent. It's Tuesday morning in the world.

I feel in a contemplative mood today, with a tinge of wariness. Already the skies are waking, and with them comes the return of a renewed sense of reality that cannot be escaped.

I am not sure why I constantly strive towards what frightens me the most. The unknown factor is certainly up there on the list. I'll be spending my last days at work listening to Beethoven's 9th symphony.



People are always surprised when you choose to throw away the illusory comfort of social entrapment. But what I regard as social entrapment may be the only thing that makes sense for them. I have learned over the years that my outlook can never be the same as that of all others, for the main reason that if everyone else did, then we wouldn't go very far. Variety in paths, outlooks and callings is what leads to the richness of minds. But this can only come if we accept it and stop striving to be 'like' everyone else, forever mourning what we don't have instead of cherishing what we do have, envying others or wishing things were different. And at the same time be ready to lose it all, because nothing was ever really ours to begin with.

"What have I done?" is the type of thought that has been haunting me. Today, the strange limbo in which I seemed to have fallen into in recent weeks finally cut me loose. And what a drop it was. I got to realise in insight that the likely reason why my job's HR department refused to acknowledge my resignation for so long was because they thought I might change my mind. I felt it, these past couple weeks - I felt that strange option hanging over me like a ghost. It drove me nuts with doubt, too. Whatever reasons and rationale I had for leaving, it was all put into question to the point where I no longer knew why I really wanted to leave in the first place.

You know me, always analysing every thought and feeling, trying so hard to make the 'right' choice according to the best odds and most likely outcomes. I ended up doing this so much with my decision to leave that yes, it blurred absolutely everything. It also led me to realise that no matter how much I try to compute all the 'data' available, and no matter how much I try to stick to reason, it just never leads to the perfect solution. Or perhaps it does, but while you're making it you can never be sure.

I'm not sure what I've just thrown away in the wind, but it does feel like I've put myself in a position of major turning point. What I mean by that is simple: it's a choice I've made major enough to have me wonder sometime down the line how 'different' things would have been if I had made the opposite choice (ie. stick with the job). What I'll only be able to know in time is whether I'll look back in wonder in a positive or negative light. With relief, or with regret.

I just couldn't go back on my decision... It is so hard for my person to make ANY decision at all in the first place... to go back on it would be like defeating the whole point, as strange as that may sound. And it's not like I'm sure of the rationale of that decision anymore... the more I think about it, the more I feel like slapping myself, in a way. But only part of me feels like that. The other is embracing the unknown factor. It keeps telling me that I have to learn to live with the decisions I make and that in the grand scheme of things it is truly nothing. It is only society pushing the false belief that one must strive for a career - yet a career means entrapment. There would never be a 'right' time to get out. There would never be enough. It would feel safe for sure, and it would give me the impression of 'going somewhere' - but it would require my whole focus... and I cannot give that. Not if I have a choice.

Perhaps I'm pulling off a Santiago. Leaving behind what felt like good enough to stubbornly continue my quest towards the real treasure. In any case, nobody ever stressed enough how hard that was.

Work is becoming unbearable these days... I have to say I'm left reeling, in a way, courtesy of the fact that as soon as I handed in my notice, everyone seemed to suddenly experience some sort of personality transplant. I literally can't go anywhere without one of my colleagues cheerfully wanting to 'go with me'. I get up for a cigarette break - my only chance to get away for five minutes and actually stretch my legs - and someone will go: "Oh, can I come with you?". I keep a dead face about me,  but then crack a painful smile and say: "Sure..."

But it's also my own doing, and this is fascinating to me. See, shortly before I made the clear-cut decision to leave, I felt this intense wave of liberation, and with it came a loosening up of my own person. Suddenly I didn't care so much, and I wasn't so distant or afraid to chat people up randomly. And as soon as I started doing that, that's exactly when people started to be friendly towards me. It just happened to coincide with my decision to leave, and it leaves me in the most awkward position... though I have - again - learned an important lesson about myself.

Are we doomed to only be ourselves when we have or feel like we have nothing left to lose?

According to a few tests online, I'm the INTP type, meaning an Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, Perceiving type. In other words, I'm the analytical type. This could have been written to describe me:

INTPs are pensive, analytical folks. They may venture so deeply into thought as to seem detached, and often actually are oblivious to the world around them.

Precise about their descriptions, INTPs will often correct others (or be sorely tempted to) if the shade of meaning is a bit off. While annoying to the less concise, this fine discrimination ability gives INTPs so inclined a natural advantage as, for example, grammarians and linguists.

INTPs are relatively easy-going and amenable to almost anything until their principles are violated, about which they may become outspoken and inflexible. They prefer to return, however, to a reserved albeit benign ambiance, not wishing to make spectacles of themselves.

A major concern for INTPs is the haunting sense of impending failure. They spend considerable time second-guessing themselves. The open-endedness (from Perceiving) conjoined with the need for competence (NT) is expressed in a sense that one's conclusion may well be met by an equally plausible alternative solution, and that, after all, one may very well have overlooked some critical bit of data. An INTP arguing a point may very well be trying to convince himself as much as his opposition. In this way INTPs are markedly different from INTJs, who are much more confident in their competence and willing to act on their convictions. ( Source: http://typelogic.com/intp.html)

The last part is the story of my life - literally. People constantly tout opinions to all and sundry, and I always have a hard time expressing any exactly because every time I do get an opinion forming inside my head it is almost instantly neutralised by my mind coming up with a flurry of other arguments that are actually just as valid. The consequence of this is that I have a deep-rooted sense that pretty much everything, except perhaps equations, bears no black and white answer...

I am not sure why, but the older I get the more attracted to numbers I find myself, which is ironic considering the trauma I went through at school when it comes to mathematics. But I said it before: "A leopard can't change its spots." And then let's not forget that I do have theories swimming within the darkest recesses of my mind which I know can only be expressed with numbers - equations - and which I am simply not able to produce yet.

In the end, I can only conclude that everything in Life always comes back full circle. One way or another.

I can't help feeling like I've somehow failed a 'test'. You know, one of those thrown at you in life that feels just like a test even if in the end it may all be random.

The worst part is that I'm growing increasingly aware of it - or rather daily occurrences are increasingly pushing my self-awareness buttons.

You know what I've come to realise? Pretty much nothing, except that it doesn't matter how long I spend trying to decide or make choices, and it doesn't matter how much time I spend agonising over it before I make that choice - in the end, that choice has as much of a chance of being wrong as it could be right. And this, my friends, is a realisation of the most depressing kind for me.

I have grown aware of two parts of me always battling for attention within me on the conscious side of things. One side is brave, addicted to challenge, resilient and smart - it possesses all the right qualities, if you like. The other side, however, represents the total sum of all my negative experiences in life, and you could almost liken it to a little devil resting on one shoulder, whispering things I now know I should try harder to ignore. But sometimes it's hard because the two 'voices' can get blurred into one, especially if emotions are running high. In fact, if emotions are triggered, I'll always be found listening to the little devil voice. That little devil voice is really nothing more than the product society made of me through bad experiences - it is whiny, weak, scared... so weak. And so easy to listen to. I fucking hate that part of me.

So it's hard to emerge from an earlier sense of certainty about a decision when you start realising that in fact you've been listening to the 'wrong' voice all along. And when the 'universe' seems intent on making you pick up on that fact, it feels even worse.

Here I stand, realising all that... not knowing what to do. Now I just feel mostly paralysed in place, more unsure than ever. If I have listened to all the wrong reasons to get to the current decision then how can I ever trust myself again to make decisions?

It's not like I'm all alone in this in some sort of blind guessing game, here. I've been experiencing the weirdest kinds of 'signs'  with such intensity recently that I know I'm supposed to take heed and LEARN. But what do you do when no matter how much you want to learn... you just can't?

It reminds me of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, funnily enough. In the story, the sisters happen to be incapable of 'reading' or picking up on social clues when it comes to society. Sure, it's all about the subtle code passed on between men and women that they're oblivious to, but the theme is the same. I find myself unable to read social clues around me. All these subtle signs and codes, the whole hierarchy bullshit... I just read it all wrong all the time, or I just don't pick up on it on time. And the only reason I'm aware of that is because life has been intent on bringing examples of those who can in my path - creating a contrast so shocking that I had no choice but to notice it.

What else is there to add? Nothing, really, because at this point I just don't know anything anymore.

Then again, was there anything I ever knew in the first place?

Free falling... That is how I feel these days, like I'm free falling into the unknown. Yet no matter how scary it may feel, I wouldn't have it any other way.

I called myself a drifter in this life a long time ago, but I only got to realise more fully what it meant in reality recently. In fact, forcing myself to face reality has had a sobering effect on me. I just confused that state of sobriety within with the death of my idealism and passion, I suppose.

Diving into the Void

Florence + the Machine, Seven Devils

I found it hard to sleep last night, and when I finally did I slipped into a dreamless slumber.

So many questions twirling inside my head... so many conflicting thoughts and emotions... 'Tis my good old ego moulded by society fighting like a wounded, rabid dog against the other side of I. The dreamer... no, the idealist.

Shit. I'd been under the impression that my idealism had died under the sheer weight of becoming a 'realist'. I got that very wrong. It's just as they say: a leopard can't change its spots.

The trouble with having to give notice before you quit a job is just that: having to give notice, meaning that you have to stay and endure the very place you decided to quit. You're already half-way gone and yet you have to continue being fully there for another period of time. That period of time is proving a real brain killer in terms of how much it leaves you at the mercy of questioning your resolve. You're just not allowed a 'clean' break. It has to be a slow, painful death of the relationship, if you like, leaving oozing pus to shoot free from the wounds. Except you can hardly let that be noticed by others, unless you don't mind 'burning a few bridges'.

I've quit a few jobs in my life before but what's different this time is the degree of repercussions my decision could have in the long run. Quitting my part-time, student job was definitely not the same as quitting my current job because the latter was a first step on the career ladder. And my ego liked it. It felt safe, strange, 'normal' - because that's what society tells you is the right thing to do. I better understand now why social status plays such a big role in human life, and I experienced for myself the power it can hold over us. Even just to have a freaking title.  To have things sort of planned out right in front of you, a sense of direction that aims to go upward in terms of social status. These things can have a powerful grip on us all.

And because I know my ego liked it, I could have stayed there and continued on the career path. I know I would have. I know my ego too much now to even doubt it. The fact that I happened to have a natural talent for the job made it all the more exciting - the sky was my limit, I would go far. But then Life always butts in and puts in my way a certain type of people - always the same - that I never learned to deal with the right way.

As I started taking over some of what my boss used to do himself, he felt increasingly threatened and literally started undermining me every time he got an occasion. I may be naturally talented, but I don't have the experience nor the 'political' clout he has gained in the many years he has worked in the industry. And I'm not  a married, middle-aged man with a mortgage to pay who can so easily relate to so many contacts in the business who just happen to be mostly mature men. I'm just this unattached young woman with a brain.

I actually realised all this during a trip my boss's boss sent me to - in place of my boss. The man really went out of his way to sabotage the opportunity I was given, but what really became a deal-breaker was when I was made aware by contacts that he was talking behind my back. To contacts. He was no longer just an asshole in the office, he was taking it to the next stage - slowly cutting me off the very source of what my job is all about: contacts.

I could have applied for another position within the company. That was an option I'd considered for the last 6 months. But he'd also been hard at work destroying my person among colleagues. And between his ability to joke all the time and play Mr Nice Guy and my awkward social skills it's no wonder everyone should believe his word over mine no matter how much I tried to open up to others and 'make friends'.

Around 10 days ago I just thought: "Fuck it, I'm leaving." And so I did. It was the most satisfying and relief-loaded feeling in a long time... but it was short-lived. As soon as the dust set in I was left with all the endless questioning as I stared at the shattered pieces of my 'career'.

My ego is reeling, but the other side of I is jumping for joy, yet I'm afraid, very afraid, of that other side. That side is just too rough, messy, disorganised, lost in a fantasy world... and I keep trying to reassure myself that the key is to merge what my ego has learned with that other side of I... to make it something better than anything I've ever been so far.

All in all, I've taken a leap of faith and I have no idea where it'll lead me. I know only one thing: I can't revert back to the way I was before I had this job. I just can't. If I did, it would be a catastrophe.

Taking a leap of faith is the scariest thing... staring deep into the unknown... and trusting that your steps will take you where you ought to be going.

Echoes and Mirrors

What if we lived in a world of mirrors? What if everything we ever thought, said and did was but reflections bouncing off from one mirror to the next? What if Reality was just that - echoes and mirror reflections we take as the real deal?

I utter a word, and that word will somehow be echoed back at me. I make a step, and that step will be reflected in someone else's step. My thoughts, so unique and personal to me, are echoed silently in the heads of many, who, just like me, believe their thoughts so unique and personal to them.

When I see someone stand before me - is it them that I see, or a reflection of I? The emotions awakened by our environment, its people and things, are constant triggers and though we are mostly trapped in reactive patterns I have to wonder. Am I seeing what I see, or am I staring at reflections of myself over and over again wherever I look? Would I be able to feel anything - would I ever be triggered in any way at all, be it in thought, emotion or action - if what triggers me in the first place (environment) wasn't showing me something more than what just seems to 'be'? Am I therefore reacting to the reality of my environment and its people, or am I in fact always only reacting to the reflections of I bouncing back from that very environment and its people?

A world of mirrors and echoes... in the midst of it all we must believe it is real. We can only be made to believe in the reality we are presented with. Till the mirror crack'd.

O Time, Time, why didn't you let me know

That to be human meant to die

Sourcing Fears

There is a scene in Star Wars' The Empire Strikes Back that depicts a young Luke Skywalker being trained by Yoda on the most desolate and hostile looking planet there could ever be. At some point Yoda makes a comment about how the young man is always looking into the future instead of taking account of what he's doing in the present.

Yoda: "This one a long time have I watched. All his life has he looked away... to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing. Hmph. Adventure. Heh. Excitement. Heh. A Jedi craves not these things. You are reckless."
(Starwars episode V:The Empire Strikes Back) 


I seem to suffer from the same predicament, except it never seemed so obvious to me. I always thought that I was focusing on the present, on what I was doing in the now, but action in reality is showing me the true extent of the picture and... I've always been lost ahead in the distance.

I know this for a fact because it hit me this morning on my way to work... There I was, walking down the street and thinking that I was really about to quit, and I felt this intense wave of fear wash over me at once. At once I tried to dig deeper within myself to find out the source of that intense fear, and the source of that fear - once found - told me everything. Well, at least some things.

The fear had very little to do with the action I was about to take, you see. The fear stemmed from imagining ahead - the consequences that might unfold as a result of that action.

"Damn conditioned mind, stop trying to come up with all the possible consequences that may or may not unfold as a result of the action I'm about to take..." I thought to myself.

When it comes to jobs it's become almost impossible not to be infected with this intense obsession of looking ahead into the future because society itself, or its system, wires most of us that way. It basically brainwashes us to associate work with wages, the latter being further linked to survival. Add to that how it entices us into lifestyles that require more and more enslaving into that vicious circle and that's it, you're pretty much done for. No matter how many times a day you'll find yourself wishing things were different, or that you were doing something different - whatever it is you find yourself moaning about - you will remain stuck in your condition because the Fear will kick in almost at once.

The Fear... the one that prompts your conditioned mind to instantly look ahead and worry about what might or might not happen if, say, you quit your job.

It all starts from a young age, really. Remember how teachers and parents would always warn you that if you didn't do well at school you'd have a crappy life/fail later in life? From that moment on, the seed is planted - we start contemplating ahead and the Fear only keeps growing from there. We become human beings trapped in the illusion that we have something to lose.

True freedom lies in having nothing to lose - true autonomy, independence, freedom of both mind and body, you name it. There is nothing that can taint you at that stage, but I know that's not a stage that can be reached at the drop of a hat.

Of course that links back to this famous notion of attachment, but the world is awash with different views or definitions of what it means and entails.

In the midst of all these thoughts that danced in my head today I couldn't shake the somewhat shocking realisation that I had been suffering from the same predicament as almost everyone else out there. That's a sobering thought.

It also changes the rules of the game for me. Challenging as this may be, I have to keep going in a direction that's pretty much akin to feeling my way in the dark - but maybe that's the whole point. Maybe that's exactly what I need, because it scares me, and if it scares me then I must be on to something real at last.

The Truth of I

To the heart within that bleeds,

Beating against a twisted chest

From sorrows unknown, the unrest

That lingers, like ghostly deeds

No longer remembered;

Did I not care for your pain,

As my hands, trembling, sought release

Even beyond the mind’s own disease?

What is the purpose of your reign,

Beside the agony left in your wake?

Bleeding worm that you are, writhing

Your way through the world’s veneer,

Trusting your hopes and longings so near,

Till the apex is reached… and nothing. 

‘Tis the reason you cry at night,

Sobbing like a child

Holding her blanket so tight,

Watching your own blood defiled

By the hounds of Man.

I walk this Earth wondering everyday who I am. Every time my mouth makes a sound, I wonder who really emitted that sound - was it really me, or a lifetime of conditioning?

My mind is racing at 200 miles an hour... sometimes it's hard even for me to keep up. Within myself there certainly is a duality. It transpires in all my writings if one ever paid close enough attention to it.

As I walked in and out of the office today I realised more concretely why I always tend to feel as though I'm stuck on the other side of a glass wall when it comes to dealing with others. It is because I do not feel fully 'awake'. I actually do not feel fully awake in this very life. It may sound very 'Matrix' like, but the blunt truth is that at some point I must have gone too far in my thinking and now going back to 'living' just like everyone else is impossible... because I just don't feel truly awake. 

How to describe it... It's like your mind can see way too many repetitive patterns everywhere, except you're not really 'seeing' them, it's more like sensing them everywhere because your mind is able to keep a tab on it all. And in the end I have to conclude: this life is an illusion.

An illusion, yes, but perhaps not a pointless one. Ultimately, life is life - but the illusion of life... then that hints at an intelligent entity having to exist to even come up with an 'illusion' of what just is in the first place.

And this is where I stand. I do not believe that this life is 'real'. It does not feel real at all. More like a half-awake dream, and every time I meet people in real life I have to make an increasing effort to remind myself to play the game - to make myself believe that maybe it's real.

Contemplations

Lost in a sea of thoughts... listening to Celtic music and plagued with the sight of double digit numbers almost every single time I inadvertently look at the time this past week or so. You know, 18:18, 12:12, 15:15 and the likes - never when I purposely aim to check the time, though. Today there was even a 13:13 but I bet now I'm talking about it means I've already paid too much attention to it and it will stop. I don't mind either way, I just found the occurrence funny.

I've been in a contemplative mood all day long, it seems. It's not such a recurrent state of mind for me for I'm mostly pensive and introspective in general, leaving me more prone to mood swings depending on where my thoughts are at when I have to interact with others. Yes, when I have to. I'm so... mercurial in essence. Today the contemplative state made me calmer, more laid-back and therefore 'nicer' a person to be around, although just as withdrawn from people I can't relate to as ever. It opened the doors to my imagination, too, and I found myself missing the writing of stories.

It's funny what the world can do to you. I am reminded of its complexities everyday and sometimes I find myself wishing I had a time machine to get back to the very beginning of human history just to see what the human world was like in its most basic state. And from there travel back forward in time to observe the subtle layers of complexities added along the way that go hand in hand with the acquirement of knowledge.

Leibniz's 'best of possible worlds' theory is based on the idea that the world in which we live is the best of all possible worlds, which makes for a somewhat fascinating theory to delve in and logically destroy - which is exactly what Voltaire did in Candide. Yet in today's world it seems a lot of people are actually convinced we do live in the best of possible worlds. Why? I'm not sure, I suppose a lot of factors lead people to follow that Leibniz-like line of thoughts. Confusing self-fulfilment in life with material gain is one reason, the fact that making yourself believe that 'things are the best they could be, really' can make you feel 'better' and less guilty about the fact that you play a direct part in the mess is another. Growing apathy in general...

So we live in a world where the majority of people actually believe that we live in the best of possible worlds and that today's outcome - or tomorrow's- could never be escaped because everything that we have done, are doing and will do is just the best we could possibly do because, hey we're human and flawed etc. Ironic that Leibniz' theory was debased and rejected especially since it takes root in theism, and yet in today's 'godless' society we still follow the same (lack of) logic.

Thinking about how indecisive I am led me to wonder as to why exactly I was - meaning, really, the mind process that leads me to a state of constant indecision. Focusing inwardly and sort of 'observing' how my thoughts unfold 'inside' I realise that I'm always analysing and computing all possible outcomes departing from one possible choice. I kid you not, I do it all the time. A choice presents itself to me and my mind engages in all sorts of mental gymnastics intent on processing all possible permutations and combinations that may unfold as a result of making a particular choice.

That's a lot of data and possible future permutations to handle, usually in a short amount of time as required by a fast-paced modern way of life. And why do I do that, beside the fact that I have the mind power to? because I'm also a perfectionist with an intense fear of failure - and that very combination of a powerful thought process along with that perfectionism and fear of failure all culminate into waste in the end because it leads more often than not to a state of endless ruminations, procrastination and ultimately lack of action.

This morning as I got out of bed and glanced at the pouring rain outside my window, I thought: "Aliska, drop it already. Just make decisions and live with it. Live with the possible wrongs and mistakes you'll surely make along the way - but unless you make choices, no matter how bad they turn out to be, you will never really learn while alive on this realm. You'll be hiding behind the illusion of knowing yourself in theory by hiding in non-action and lack of decision-making of your own volition, and that would ultimately say nothing about who you really are as a person in the world, or what you're really made of beyond your own imaginary conception of who you are (Ego). You cannot get away from that truth."

As freeing as these thoughts may have been for a moment, it's left me with a rather unnerving feel in the pit of my stomach.

Not the same

Only three weeks ago it was as though I was somebody else. Well, it was me, only less restrained and... freer. It was as though I was finally getting to be myself, and my whole person was radiant, confident, open and outgoing despite the constant stress of work... and the strangers I met... well, it felt as though we'd always known one another. And then I had to get back to this side of the world and the same old suffocating feeling wrapped itself around me at once. And at once I reverted back to a ghost with no purpose, no care, nothing.

I miss the humid heat, how it makes my hair curl as it falls heavily down my back and sticks to my neck in a sweat.

The stagnation in which I'm immersed over here feels like a sickness of the soul. How can you feel so sick in one part of the world and yet so alive in the other? Is it just my imagination or is there more to it?

I feel like I'm drowning in a sea of indifference and greed. There are so many people all around me, but they might as well be made of wood. They might as well not be real.

An old colleague of mine used to say her indecisiveness was the symptom of a diseased soul and the only way to make it better was to stop questioning things too much. As soon as she followed that advice she quit her job and agreed to get into an arranged marriage. I am not sure that was the right cure, but there you go.

And I'm bored. Society hasn't changed much throughout the centuries. Sure, we tend to get married later in life nowadays, but all it really means is that babies have old people for parents more often than not. And these 'oldies' for parents are often obsessed with juggling a career too.

What fascinates me is older women - as in over 30 - having kids. They'll parade their newborns on social networks as though they were the first women in the whole world to have children. And then they'll call the child 'my little pie' or 'my sweet princess' or whatever. It always makes me wonder if they even realise that this child is really a person separate from them who will develop a mind of their own. Historically speaking, it's not hard to see that most of the time parents tend to forget it and then spend a painful amount of time trying to 'mould' their own kids into what they want them to be. It rarely works, but it explains why most people in the world are fucked up in some way. It always goes back to childhood, eh. 

Anyway... I am so indecisive. I need to stop overthinking and just make a decision - and live with it.

I feel so broken these days. They say life would be empty without the presence of other people, but it seems to me the only reason we tend to suffer so much is because of others. People. Most of us are so warped up inside our own heads - and yes, that's not just me - that we grow into chronic, self-centred selfishness personified.

Add to that the appeal of materiality, that of striving towards amassing always more - money, goods, food, a higher status, etc... and when I look around all I see is the equivalent of a parched desert no matter how much the lights of the city may glitter in the night.

So I have no heart, or rather it is the size of a tiny prune - but in a world that is itself unable to grow the true capacity for love, how could I ever learn?

I'm actually starting to suspect I do have a heart - and it is big. And that's because it's big in the middle of a desert that it hurts so much.

I went to meet my friend last night. We don't get to see each other that often anymore... More often than not she sticks with her family when she's not working long hours. She's picked up the bad habit of running late all the time, and it's something I see with a lot of other people as well. They just lose their ability to be punctual. I haven't, so it always strikes me as odd to see that so many people just don't care enough to be on time anymore.

I'd just left the house and was on my way to the bus stop when I received her first text, saying she would be 15 minutes late. I shrugged, I wasn't in a hurry. I arrived at our rendez-vous point five minutes earlier, so I took a stroll down the busy street, gazing at the shop windows with a vacant look about me. It took another 20 minutes before she finally arrived, and at that point I wondered if it wasn't her way of making me understand she doesn't care about me. I refused to let the sour thought get the better of me - she is one of very few friends I have at all, and I found myself thinking: "I don't care how long you make me wait, I don't care that it's raining and cold, I don't care that I have to wait. Just come."

Finally, she arrived - dazzling and full of life. What a beautiful friend I have, I thought for a second, so at ease in the world... when did that happen? "We're drifting apart..." The thought struck me like a wrecking ball at once.

As we sat inside a lively Brazilian bar with some fancy cocktails, we had much to discuss. We hadn't seen each other in a month, and in that month I'd gone away to Asia, and she wanted to know everything about it, so I did most of the talking for a while. I asked her for some worldly, practical advice about my job, knowing that she was far more knowledgeable within the realm of social conduct than I could ever dream to be. At some point I even took notes of what she was advising me to say in particular situations. To my surprise, she didn't find it odd, and even when I grumbled: "Look at me, so clueless," she shook her head and replied: "You're not clueless, Aliska."

Aren't I? I need to take notes from more socially aware people to know what or how I'm supposed to react.

My problem is that I'm the avoidant type, as a direct result of past traumas in life. I avoid confrontation like the plague, remaining 'nice' and 'fair' instead. But here's what I've learned about most people in this world: they may be adults, but you have to treat them the same way a parent needs to discipline their kids. Tough love, so to speak. Unless you treat adults around you with a firm hand, they will push their luck and try hard to dominate or take advantage of you just like CHILDREN.

Who are the kids and who are the adults in this world? What does 'adult' even mean? At least with children you still get raw honesty, which is something that disappears swiftly with most people as they grow older. The skills they seem to replace honesty with would be the art of scheming and hypocrisy - for a profit. Always for a profit.

Anyway... I can feel that I've entered a new phase in my existence, one that's going to last quite a few years - renewed social isolation and alienation. Solitude.

Interlude

I remember - do you?

Yes, I remember.

I remember the sweet scent of summer

When all the trees are bare - wait,

I meant  to say winter.

I remember the scent of death,

Before the rain of life,

Before the breath of Man,

I remember breathing the scent

Of Time, of flavours past,

The everlasting song

Of burning flowers in the sky,

The ones they call sunlight.

I remember - do you?

I do.

I remember the taste of empty shells

Rolling down across the shore,

And your skin, like sandpaper

Made my own bleed silently.

And then the wind was howling

Whispers in my ears,

Screaming at your face,

It was winter in summer.

I remember - do you?

I do.

Back to Reality

It's hard for me to believe that a mere few days ago I was wandering up and down the streets of the Far East's city of lights... Dazzled, stressed but most of all bemused.

The humid heat hit me as soon as I stepped out of the airport - like the heat of an oven wrapping itself around me at once. I stumbled forward, dazed and confused, looking around me with blinking eyes. A few moments later I could feel droplets of sweat rolling down my back, but already my whole being was embracing the uncanny climate. I swapped the shoes for a pair of cheap flip flops bought in one of those massive stores that never seem to close for the night. And from then on began my express trip into the unknown.

Though days are only made of 24 hours, this past week turned out so packed with events and unexpected turns that it left me feeling as though I've somehow spent a lifetime there. As I rushed from one meeting to the next, hailing one cab after another to get me places faster, my mind was overwhelmed by the incredible weight of sensory overload. Sounds, smells, sights... all of it hitting me like unrelenting waves, leaving me dazzled and at loss for words.

And it was during that trip that I fully realised the beauty of meeting strangers. Strangers in the night, unexpected helping hands, conversations born out of the unknown... I thought: "So long as I don't need to create deeper bonds with others, I can actually manage it well..." I am a 'good' stranger, but no one should ever try and get to know me better. Like the brightest of flames, I would burn the curious moth.

Strangers... they appeared in my wake just at the right time, each time. As I ran up and down the streets in search of my hotel to grab my suitcase and dash back to the airport for my next flight, the intense heat and lack of water in my body hit me like a rock on the head... Panting and feeling like a ball of fire about to implode, I pushed my way through the midday crowds invading the streets like a rising human tide, unable to find my way back to that darn hotel. Panic seeped further into me as I looked at the time - I had less than 2 hours left to get to the airport and check in. I remember stopping in my tracks, feeling as though I was suddenly stuck in some sort of fast-forwarded movie... the crowds, the intense heat weighing on me, the glare of the sun in my eyes, the fuming cars all around in the midst of tall skyscrapers... I blinked and saw that a cab was waiting, idle, on the side of the street. I dashed in its direction, and without even asking whether I could or not, I slipped in the back of the car and said: "To that hotel, as fast as you can, please."

A few moments later, I had finally arrived at the main station to take the express train back to the airport, and that was when I realised that I didn't even know which terminal my flight was on. I got up from my seat inside the train, looking around as yet another wave of panic crashed against me. I meekly asked a group of Asian travellers if they knew which terminal my flight was on... they shrugged, uncertain. And then a young man waved a hand and said: "That's my flight too. We need to go to Terminal 1." I stared at him for a moment in silent relief and before I knew it we were making our way inside the terminal together, with him as my unexpected white knight in shinning armour.

As I followed him around and he took care to lead me to all the right places, the panic waned, leaving in its wake an intense wave of relief. We still had some time before the flight, and so we decided to have something to eat and as we sat there eating our pork burgers, we started chatting away like old friends. After another moment, I realised we didn't even know each other's names. We laughed as I held out a hand to shake his. "I'm Aliska, by the way," I said with a light giggle. "You can call me Koh," he replied, smiling.

"I am so glad to have met you... you have no idea how much you've helped me," I said.
"Yeah, I could see you looked really panicked."
"You have no idea..."
"Don't worry, it's all good now."
"But really... thank you for helping me."
He shrugged.
"When unexpected things like that happen, you should always help. And by the way, welcome to Asia," he added with a chuckle.

Soon enough, it was time to board the plane, and we last saw each other at the baggage collection. He showed me the way to the taxi line waiting outside the airport, and then we parted ways. Two strangers whose paths had crossed for only a mere moment in time, and as the purpose of our unexpected meeting came to an end, so did our association.

On my last day before returning home, I was again dazzled by the beauty of meeting strangers. This time it was a girl who, upon learning that I was leaving in the evening, decided she should take me to the top of a tower to enjoy a few cocktails in the sunset. And there we sat, seemingly on top of the world, chatting away like two old friends. As we parted ways, we hugged and I said: "I feel as though I'm going to see you tomorrow..." and she laughed, nodding. "Yes, it's hard to believe you're actually leaving."

But then the girl also left me with more food for thought. We had been talking about work, the corporate universe and the likes. At some point she said: "You know, I'm a crazy girl, I'm not normal... just saying because you shouldn't expect other people around here to behave the way I do."

"Well," I replied, beaming, "I'm mighty glad I met you on the way. And don't ever think you're not normal. Nobody is."

"Hmm... I also don't think I'm cut out for the corporate world," she went on, pensive and then waved a hand around us. "All this... That's not me."

I pondered her words silently for a moment. What about me? Was this me? This role I had been sucked into, that of suddenly being turned into the jet-setting girl rushing from place to place, meeting bosses and playing the part of the knowledgeable business woman... was that me? My head was swimming with way too much information to be able to formulate even the start of an answer. But I knew how it felt within me... like a web tightening its hold around me... and that impression within scared me because deep down I know I am like the little lamb playing it tough among the big, big wolves. And whenever I think about that fact, I feel like running back into my mother's arms.

Lana Del Ray, Born to Die

Beyond all this, though... this trip proved a powerful eye-opener. One that left me feeling as though some part of me had always been from that side of the world, as strange as that may sound. Or perhaps a better way to describe how it felt to be there would be to say: "I feel as though I've already been there in a past life."