The Illusion

and so, we make plans.

we try to map out our future.

we make goals to achieve, places to be, things to see.

we create lists of 'stuff I need to do before I turn 30'.

we write down what we want in that one person to share our lives with.

we chart straight routes through open fields.

not realising that we've missed the whole point.

that it is about not knowing. it is never about rigid plans or straight roads.

that in our quest to reach the destination, we forget the journey.

that control is an illusion, and our maps fallible.

that the adventure lies in not knowing.

sometimes in straightjacket perspectives.

and the 'maybes' on the road less traveled.

Shards of Home

"I've knocked for about, ten times now. Hello? Is there any light in that bulb of yours?"

Yes, what bulb? No, you knocked maybe thrice. Come on in.

He made space on the table; papers were strewn all over so he pilled them up in a corner and placed a metal container on them.

"Yeah, well, here's lunch. Sorry they ran out of mustard. Medium rare, as ordered."

What? A burger with no mustard is like, a boat with no propellers, a car with no tyres, a..

"Uhuh, sure. Got any beer?"

He got off his chair and took two bottles from the fridge.

"Your desk looks like a warzone. You ever do any work in here?"

Well, he rolled his eyes and took a swig of his beer, I try not to do work in here. After all, it's only my office. I try to do work at home, after work hours.

"Ha. Funny. I think you should have done stand-up."

I think so too. Shouldn't have been a writer. There's no money in it. No, no, swallow, and then talk. Can't have you choking to death in my office. Thanks for the burger, by the way.

"Don't mention it. And if I do choke, and you don't save me, I'm haunting you. I mean it. What are you writing -" he reached for his beer but accidentally pushed the metal container off the table, spilling the contents all over the floor.

"Hell, I'm sorry, dude. Let me pick it up-"

No, it's fine, I got it. Don't move, please. You may damage a piece.

He got down on his knees and reverently placed the pieces back into the box, counting as he went. After he was done, he placed the box in his table drawer.

"Hey," he broke the silence that fell on the room, "If you don't mind my asking, what's with the box?"

It's...a long story. And maybe even a little complicated. Where do I even begin...

~

This is part one of a short story. Let me know what you think!

a

Darkness and All Her Friends

I had this strange conversation with a great friend yesterday. Incidentally, she's the first peer I know who will be getting married. Over the course of all these years, she's inspired me to be a better person, she's there with the reminder that God is always here, that He never left and will never leave.

I told her some of my small issues, that the people who love you the most, hurts you the most.

She answered, of course, if not, you didn't love them. She said man will fail you, man will break your trust.

But to that, I have no reply. I mean, I used to believe in people. I did. I believed in the good in people. Now, when a friend asks for help, my first reaction is to be wary. I guess this is what life does to you, it makes you jaded and.. I don't know.. old. I always thought that I won't give in, that I won't let life change me that way, to be something that, in my opinion, was less than who I was.

Now? I don't know. Even without realising it, I've changed. A year ago, I could have sworn I wanted to remain single for the rest of my life, but that was just me being scared and immature. I didn't want the responsibility of taking care of another life when mine was all over the place. I was scared, I guess, to open up my heart and be hurt again. And then, circumstances change and someone walked in.

And I sincerely thought, this was it, but it was not to be, and she walked out. Take it from someone who's been there, timing matters, more than you know. I hear it from my older friends, but never thought much about it.

I mean, how can anyone not turn jaded?

I told her I am an optimist. My friend replied really? I couldn't tell from your blog.

To which I said with a laugh, darkness makes a better muse than sunshine and butterflies.

She said I don't know, darkness will swallow up hope and optimism.


I don't know about that. I think hope and optimism contrasts more starkly against the darkness. That if not for darkness, you won't see it.

And at the end of the day, I know that the darkness will recede and disappear. It always does. Hope and optimism won't. Maybe this will be the part of me that will remain constant.
as

The Problem

If there is a problem with the world,
It is that people think that sad endings in movies are the real endings.

If there is a problem with the world,
It is that everyone wants change, but few are willing to sacrifice for it.

It is that money solves everything.

It is that faith starts wars.

It is that hope is a lie.

It is that love is a weakness.

If there is a problem with the world,
It is that morality and honour has a price.

It is that humanity thrives on inhumanity.

It is that peace must be bought by fire and blood.

But, above all, if there is a problem with the world,
It's not you,

It's me.

Say What You Need to Say

Recently, I've been watching this tv show called Lie to Me. And, of course, I know that shows are often inaccurate portrayals of life, but sometimes, they are.

While the show was strictly about half truths and whole lies, it made me reflect a little on my character and our society today. Yes, I would say that I am a very good liar, but that's not the point here.

My point is, why don't people say what they want to say? Putting aside controversial remarks and questions, why is it so rare that people tell you exactly what is on their mind? Of course, this may bring about anarchy under some circumstances, but I am talking about answers to the simplest questions.

"How are you today?"

And I would reply that I am fine, when in actual fact, my cat ran away, someone broke in and killed my dog then set my house on fire etcetc. Why is it so hard to tell a person, "Oh, not too good, but thanks for asking."

Of course, there'd be nothing that I could do for you if all of the above actually happened, but I've found that everyone wants to be heard. You disagree? Well, when you hurt, why do you write songs or poems or create art? I write, and then put it here, because I want to be heard and understood.

So, yeah, why? Is it because vulnerability is a weakness? Because, it's not. To be vulnerable is probably one of the greatest acts of courage. It ranks right up there with picking up a spider with your bare hands.

You ever heard the saying, 'Life is not complicated. We make it so.'? I think it'll be so much easier to live this way then trying to figure out what someone is saying or not saying all the time, trying to read in between the lines and trying to understand the thought behind the word.

Or maybe it's time I realised that people actually say the most when they say the least.
as

People Always Leave

I wanted to save this post for the next few days, but writing is what I do 'whenever hearts are heavy and company not wanted'. I thought this post could not be more juxtaposed with the previous one I wrote, about people and how they find you.

But, come to think of it, it is more of a continuation of the same train of thought. The train just stopped me a little ways farther down the line, in a different station, that's all.

To the point, and you'd have to have read the previous post to fully understand this.

Is there a reason two people walk into each other's lives and then walk out of it again? It's not that they were mere acquaintances, these two people were friends, maybe lovers. They come in, and change your life, as you do theirs, and all of a sudden, they are gone.

People invest a part of their souls into people. That's how change occurs. How can a person, who is so much a part of you, who played so big a part in the person you are today, just disappear? And when you meet again, its two different people. To all intents and purposes, two strangers.

It's just.. difficult to comprehend. That someone so important to you, someone who you were important to, becomes a stranger, just like that.

Because people always leave, right? Sometimes, yeah, they do come back. But you read between the lines, and you figured out that, sometimes, no, they don't.

No, they don't. But then again, is it people who left?

Or was it you?
as

People and Fate

'People are what is important in your life.'

I don't remember who said it, or where I heard it, but so far, this statement has been true. I wonder sometimes at the people that God has put in my life without my knowing it. I am not talking about the people that you meet because you decided to do so, like a girl you think is quite pretty and you go up to her and say hi. Of course these people are very important too.

I am talking about the people that you bump into on the street, the people that fate - lets call it fate - pushed on you, for no apparent reason. I count people such as these to be among the most important in my life. I'd be hard pressed to recall where or how we met, or even how we got close, but, yet, here we are.

You ever think about it? About the roads that you choose - or stumbled on - that made you this person. About the paths that you walked - maybe even crawled - just to be in that exact moment to meet that one significant person. And then you wonder about the byways they took, just to be who they are, just to meet you there.

It's more than I can comprehend.

But yet, it is these people that have changed my life. I have no reason to know Jon, but I do, and God has used him to open doors for me. I went unwillingly to a new church - which I now attend - and I've been blessed with someone I can actually look up to. I walked into Life College, and I met Andrea and Lynette, two people who are so capable and so full of life.

Andrea told me, "Jing, let's go Genting!" to which I replied, a little non-enthusiastically, "Really? Who with?"
She said, "I don't know, I'll find a few people."

And that's how I met Crystal. No reason whatsoever, just someone who wanted to go Genting, meeting someone who went reluctantly - reluctantly until told that a pretty girl was going.

The closest friends that I have miraculously turned up during a painful time in my life. I've known them for years, but somehow, at that exact moment when I needed people most, they turned up.

It is a bizarre phenomenon, if you think about it. Call it fate, call it destiny, call it whatever you want. It's complicated.

But at the same time, it isn't. It's really simple. It's just two people, meeting under circumstances that seems like a line out of a best-seller, somehow making an instant connection and knowing that they'd be in the other's life in a significant way.

And neither life will ever be the same again.
as

Down in the Dumps

I wonder why people can't just stay sad for a little while.

I have this violent urge to go out and do stuff whenever I am feeling sad. I need to be constantly keeping my mind busy and my body in action, just so for that moment, I'd be okay. I want to be alone, just so I'm allowed to be quiet, but even then I just want to stop thinking about it.

Why can't people stay sad for awhile? Why does everyone around them try to make their day better? Because nothing helps, nothing. Not music, not books, not deep conversations. They only feed the disquiet so it'll go away for a few hours, but then it comes back hungry again.

Why can't people, you and I, just accept that it is okay to be sad. It is okay to be down and you don't need to drown it out. You don't need to feed it with music to make it go away. It's okay to not want to be happy, at least for that moment.

Maybe, just embrace it, that for now, sad is what you will be.  Accept it, don't drown it out, don't feed it or starve it, don't ignore it.

You'll be okay. You're just sad.
as

The Wall

I don't understand. There's a wall, and I keep throwing myself on it. Beating it with everything I have, hitting it repeatedly.

It's not breaking. I don't understand.

If it doesn't break soon...I will.
as

Through the Eyes of a Child

She kept quiet as I told her my tale. She doesn't normally keep quiet.

It's nice, you know? When I need someone to listen, they don't give me advice and try to point me in the right direction. All she did was listen, and then she told me her story.

It was only later, after a day or two, she wrote me a short note.

She wrote 'It is a blessing to love someone, and it's worth it because that's what true love is.'

At that time I couldn't, and wouldn't agree.

But now, some weeks later, they make more sense to me.

It's in line with the only definition of love that I agree on.

The bible says '..it is not self-seeking...it keeps no record of wrongs..it always trusts, always hopes always perseveres.'

It is selfless, it forgives, it always trusts, always hopes and it perseveres.

And if I can't understand this, then I have no business trying anymore.
as

'Get Out There!'

I drove to Bangi just yesterday, to interview a couple of friends (I can now call them friends) for one of the projects I've been working on.

Afterwards, my co-labourer asked me, 'How was it?'

My answer to him was, 'Surprisingly, calm.'

And I was. Let me tell you right up, I've never sat down to do a one-on-one (in this case, one-on-two) interview with anyone. It's a new experience for me, to sit and chat with someone who was, at the beginning of the conversation, a total stranger.

One of the people I interviewed said this, 'The problem with the youth of today is that they stay in their comfort zone. They need to get out there.'

I agreed wholeheartedly with his words, but after reflecting upon them, I realised, yeah, that's exactly what I did. I stepped out, and it is actually a pretty awesome feeling. I was quite a shy kid, and while it is no major breakthrough, it is still a step forward.

So, I will echo his words here, and I hope you will find the experience uplifting.

Get Out There!

as

Goodbye

I guess, humans will never actually get used to saying goodbyes. It's not natural to be okay when someone leaves. It's not natural to be fine when you know there's a possibility you'd never see them again.

I hate it. I hate saying goodbye. It's one of the reasons why I don't say hello too often now. I know it is a sad way to live, but hey, we all have our demons.

You've made me so much of who I am today. Can you believe it has been five years already that we've grown and walked together? Your fingerprints won't fade, ever. There's not many people who have impacted my life in such a powerful way, and you made that list. In fact, you're probably on the top five.

I am not begrudging you answering the call to impact more lives. Go and spread your wings and fly and be all, be everything. Just know that, I am proud to be able to call you friend. I am proud to be counted on the list of people that you will miss. I am proud that in my own way, I reflect the example that you show.

So...goodbye. And godspeed.
as

Lessons LDR Taught Me

The third and final post on this topic (hopefully, because I don't think this writer can take many more lessons).

Lesson 6: If you love her, let her go.
It's not something new. But, friends, remember, that she was never yours to begin with. No one ever actually belongs to anyone. If they choose to walk with you, it's their choice; if they choose to walk a perpendicular path, then you have no say in it. All of us, even when married, cannot claim ownership of another life. In a sense, the life is on loan from God.
You ever heard of the old maxim? 'If you love something, let it go. If it comes back, then it's yours'. Not really, no, if it comes back, it decides to do so, but it is not yours.

Lesson 7: Have a little faith
It has so far been a short road, but of course I doubt. I doubt her sometimes, and I doubt my heart in this. I guess, there's no cure to this, but to just have a little more faith in her. Obviously, I walked into this liking the strength and character that I saw in her, and I remind myself that my doubts are unfounded and actually quite silly.
It's not just about her. Sometimes, it is hard to find the resolve in wanting to continue walking down this road. I guess, I doubt that I have what it takes to continue on.

Lesson 8: Hope
So much has changed over the course of these months. Of course, I am looking forward to the day when she's back, but people change. I guess, the hope here is that no matter the change, we could find a way to relearn about each other, and that in relearning, we find more to like and more strengths to admire in the other. The hope is that I would not hold on to who she was in the past, and recognise that the person she has become is no less awesome, if not more.

This road, while nowhere as tough, seeing that I am facing challenges on my homeground, has been a long and educational one. A year ago, if you'd have asked me if I would do an LDR, my answer would be an unequivocal no. I am only on this road because I know her for who she is, and I believed it would work. Let's see what the next two months will hold.
as

Leaving Through the Window

I drove approximately 500 kilometers yesterday, from KL to Kuantan and back. I don't know why, but driving always seems to help when I need to clear my head or release some pent up frustration.

It didn't work. I drove all the way to Teluk Cempedak. As I stared out into the South China Sea, all I wanted was to drive away, drive even further. Drive until now is gone and I was back in before. Never coming home..just, driving...
klj

Busy Busy

So a short update on what I am/will be/have been doing so far this year if you are interested.

I am still studying (you'd be surprised how many people ask me this) Diploma in Mass Comm at Segi UC. This semester, Photography and Videography are the heavy subjects. For Videography, we are doing a short film based on Adam Young's You Had Me At Hello (idea given by the awesome Crystal), and I am really excited to get a look at the finished product.

I recently started a job as a Stringer (a freelance journalist) with a local paper, The Malay Mail (this is what I've written so far). God has been good, and doors have been opening for me. Unlike the newsrooms that are exhibited on the telly, the newsroom at MM is actually civil and even docile. I wonder if bigger papers are more chaotic...

Lastly, I am working with (actually under, the guys have so much more experience in this) a few people on producing a report for One Young World 2011. OYW is a global youth summit, where youths (I use the term loosely, young people would fit the bill better) from all over the world come together to share ideas and listen to influential leaders expound on issues and whathaveyous. Actually, this is the project that I am most excited about, and thus far, working on it has been a blast.

Hope everything is going well with you! :)

A Primal Need for Validation

In both Wild at Heart and The Way of the Wild Heart, John Eldrege talked about a man's need to validated. He talks about how the need is ingrained in every man (I have yet to read Captivating, but someone dear to me has generously borrowed me it) and how every man - he used the word every - needs and wants -yearns - to be validated.

The sad part is that, there are too many of us (I believe I fall into this category) who look for validity in the wrong place; in most occasions, we look for validity in the woman, who John believes to be the epitome of beauty in creation (I totally agree with him).

He wrote that 'No woman can satisfy this longing in a man's heart, and no good woman wants to try.'

As I read his words over and over again, I think to myself was this what has happened over the years? I believe I did seek to be validated from my exes, who should not have had to take responsibility to validate me. I know I did - maybe still do - with this awesome girl God has put into my life.

It is as if I handed them a blank sheet of paper and asked them to read it to me.

And that's not all of it. I believe I seek to be validated from so many other sources. Who I am today is because of my need to be validated. I am a good son, because that way I will be validated by my parents. I try so hard to be a good man, because then I will be validated by society.

Don't you see it now? There is a primal and a deep pit of yearning to be validated in a man.

God asked me yesterday, as I sat in church thinking about this, what about Me? Do you need to be validated by Me? Do you yearn and hunger for my validation?

I had no reply, but He didn't need one. He knew my answer. The one source, the only way to be truly validated, and all my life I have disregarded it. I seek validation from work, from results, from peers, from girls, from every source but my Lord.

I don't know what went wrong, just that it did.

But, I do know that it is not too late to take that fork on the road, you see it? A little up, a ways there. No, it's not too late to try and find my way back.
as

When the Earth Moves

What happens when the earth moves?

Quite simply, earthquakes, big waves and a whole lot of mess. This is besides my point, but I don't think I am ready for the End Of All Things yet. I still want to explore, dream, discover. 

But, back to my point, when the earth moves, everything is affected. Buildings, trees, even oceans. Lives are affected. It destroys our human illusion of control.

I wrote this post a along time ago, a little under a a year, back when life was just starting to make sense. Back when I just found signboards pointing me towards home again.

And yet, a year on, the earth is still moving under me, the ground is still shaking. I am still finding my road home, but home is an ever-changing location. All directions are labeled 'home' by the signboard at the T-junction.

So, what happens when the ground of your heart decides to shake again?

The same thing happens. Your life is changed. Everything moves. Your house is destroyed, and you need to find another place which will withstand the shaking.

But, as I sit here and write, I know that no matter the pain and the instability, all this can be a step forward. A conscious decision is made to change, a step is taken in the direction of a new house, with hopeful optimism that this one will be the last and the best one you've been in.

And maybe, one day, we will all realise that the house that we have found is in actuality, a home. Your very own home.

Godspeed, Japan and all the areas affected by the tsunami. Godspeed, all the families who have lost and are hurting. Godspeed, all of you who are looking for a place to call home.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

How happy are the blameless Vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd. 

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind remains to this day one of my favourite movies of all times. If you've not watched it, please do, but there are some spoilers here.

The movie
This movie is a love story about how even though a person is erased from your mind, there's no way you can erase the other from your heart. Joel is a writer, an introspective and reserved person. Clementine is a free-spirit, fiery and enthusiastic about everything. You can see how the relationship may not work out, and after awhile Clementine decides to walk away because she feels trapped (there's more to it, but go watch the movie). She undergoes an operation to wipe out her memory.

Upon finding out that Clementine now no longer knows him, Joel decides to go for the same operation. However, during the operation, the subconscious Joel decides that he no longer wants to forget about Clementine, and he wants to hold on to all their memories together. His mind runs to every significant memory that they had together and he tried, so hard, to hold on to them.

Goodbye
Their last goodbye was the most haunting I've ever seen in a film.

Clementine: Joely? What if you stayed this time? 

Joel: I walked out that door. There's no memory left. 

Clementine: Come back and make up a goodbye, at least. Let's pretend we had one.....Goodbye, Joel. 

Joel: .....I love you. 

Clementine: ...Meet me at Montauk....

So they both went about their lives, completely oblivious that they had been so big a part of each other's lives. Through the strangest of chances, they meet again on the train to Montauk, and again, they hit it off, and another twist shows them that they've actually loved before. The story ends with this quote.

Joel: I can't see anything that I don't like about you. 

Clementine: But you will! But you will. You know, you will think of things. And I'll get bored with you and feel trapped because that's what happens with me. 

Joel: Ok. 

Clementine: Ok.

Reflection
I reflected on a host of memories, and actually I still am, which has lead me to this post. I am holding on so, so tightly to everything that I can remember of you and I. I don't want to lose them, because time will erase these memories. Even though I wrote it down, it's not the same, remembering a smile and reading about it.

Where will you and I be, in 79 days? I don't know, but that is a long time. Apropos, I will try my best, and then some more, to hold on to everything, the peaceful evenings in parks, that walk around KLCC, your scent that lingers in my car, the way your fingers leave traces of ice on my skin, that roadtrip where I decided that I want to know this crazy person a little more, lunches in KL, the quirky way you talk, Skype chats.

Our snowy December together, us cooking (or rather you cooking and me watching) together, snuggled up against the cold, Edinburgh, Whitby, London, Oxford and that beautiful day in Middlesbrough. The letters that I treasure most, above all my earthly possessions, the few songs that you sang, your artwork, your crooked smile and your silly dances.

And, like the movie, my answer to the question that you never asked, is a shrug, a smile, and an OK.

A Misguided Ghost

"I think..No, I believe that I am given my gift so I could help people. I hope I don't write anything that lessens anyone's life. I want to add to it."

This person I just met, barely half an hour into our first conversation, already gave me something to think about.

I guess, I am wondering what I've been doing all this while...And since I am still wondering with no answer at the moment, I guess I may take a little break off of writing here.

I feel...thin. Sort of stretched, like...butter scraped over too much bread. I need a holiday. A long holiday.

But, unlike Bilbo, I very much do intend to return, so come back periodically and hopefully we'll be back on track. Not this track, but the track that I wish to be on.

A song comes to me at this moment, it goes like this.

I'm going away for awhile

But I'll be back don't try to follow me

I'll return as soon as possible

...

I'm just one of those ghosts

Travelling endlessly

as

The Way of the Wild Heart

1. Don't let God ride shotgun, let Him drive.
2. Don't avoid confrontation.
3. Don't be passive.
4. There are four stages in a man's life: Cowboy, Warrior, Lover, King.
5. Don't make any woman the center of your universe.

Just lessons and thoughts written in John Eldrege's The Way of the Wild Heart as I see it. I'll keep adding to the list as I go on with the book, but I thought I really needed to write it down somewhere in lieu of my missing journal.
as

Limbo

You know how it is, when you wake from a deep slumber, only to fall back into a state of semi-sleep? A state of limbo in between two worlds, where words are breathed and lights are ephemeral.

Everything is unreal, you hear it all, but it is as if sounds come from across an ocean, and you see it all, but everything is non-distinct, shapes that are blurry at the edges. Colours are dispersed, nothing makes sense.

You ever wonder if there are some of us who go through life like that? Walking, breathing, talking, laughing. But to all intents and purposes, half asleep. Or half awake, stuck in the in-between state. A light with a switch that was not flipped on.

Could you tell if he was looking but never seeing? Listening but never hearing? Nodding but never understanding? Reacting but never acting? Could you?

All lost. Lost, the bread-crumbs that lead to their cottage all eaten by birds. Lost, floundering in a dark sea without realising, caged in the confines of their minds, trapped in a prison that they never intentionally made.

Could you help them? Would you? Of course you would.

But should you? What if the only way that they could deal with life is by disassociating? What if existing in a waking sleep is the only way, the only way out. Paradoxically, it is also the only way in.

I wonder if I do sometimes, if my systems shut down and I go into limbo. There are two years of my life, that however hard I try, I cannot recall anything significant.

What was I doing? Where was I?

And, for that matter, where were you?
as

Dismantle, Repair

Because repairing something always requires dismantling what is broken.

Take it apart, piece by piece. Part by part.

Find what went wrong, sift through the screws and gears for an answer.

And then, maybe, salvaging it. Piece it together and stitch it up.

Make it new again.

Make it yours again.

Lessons LDR Taught Me

This is part two of a post with the same title. I think the title may not be so apt now; it should have been lessons LDR highlighted, but to digress...


Lesson 6: Change
What I always, always need to remember is that people will change. No it is not a bad thing, I personally think that one of the ways an individual can take a step forward in life is by changing. If the individual changes for the better, well, so much the better (no pun intended), if for the bad, he or she would realise that somewhere, something has gone wrong and rectify the problem, which is again, a good thing.
So, change. From experience, one of the things that I could not deal with in the past was that they changed. My immaturity couldn't see past the fact that they were not the same person.
Even now, 7000 miles away, a part of me finds it hard to deal with that change. I know that she has changed, but so have I. But then again, a huge part of me wishes that I could be there to see her develop her potential and come into all that she can be.

Lesson 7: I Am Not Enough
I have come to understand that I can't be everything for her, not especially from so far away. I don't know about most guys, but some of us (myself included) have a martyr syndrome, a serious psychological defect where we'd jump in front of a bus for you, take a bullet etcetc, it even affects the friendships that we have. But then again, if we (sorry for generalising, but to write 'some of us guys' all the time is very taxing) thought this way, to a certain extent it implies that they (friends, girlfriends, wives etc) can't stand up for themselves and that they are weak. I just want to say that this can't be further from the truth. Most of us are hardwired that way, and I think it will be very difficult to separate a man from his protective instinct.
as
Part three is currently being written, stay tuned.
as

Past, Present, Future

I've often gotten remarks from acquaintances about being a guy who blogs and writes. Usually, remarks from the male species goes something like, "You write (insert slightly disgusted facial expression)? About what? Your day? Your feelings?" while the girls usually are more ambivalent.

Regardless, my reply to their 'about what?' question would usually be "Oh, you know, anything that inspires me, absolutely anything." To which their reply would be a slightly perplexed silence.

But as I ponder slightly more about it, I realised so much has changed over the past few years, and to understand, I need to bring you back to who I was before, circa 2006-2008.

Without boring you, I was a mess back then. After high school - which I scraped through - I entered into a wilderness, unsure of myself, no clear direction in life. I was so lost. I skipped most of classes in A-Levels, which resulted in, again, barely passing. It was in this time of wandering and confusion I met a girl, who, now that I actually think about it, I really wronged. To a certain extent, I am partly to blame for her fall. At that time, I was searching for direction, and I thought I could find my identity in a girl, while at the same time, she was trying to find her identity in me. Needless to say, we both ended up disappointed and hurt. Again, with her, I was barely myself, I became the person she wanted me to be, and I don't have to tell you that that's not going to work.

After her, I was really lost, hell, she was the focus of my life for a year and a half. I drifted through a few jobs, and I wish I could tell you that in that period I really looked at my life, but I didn't. By nature, I hate confrontation, and to acknowledge that that was the lowest point in my life took a core of steel I just did not have. I closed my eyes and just sleep-walked through endless days of twilight.

There was no big catastrophe that made me change, but by random happen-chance, I read this quote by Paulo Coelho, in an introduction he wrote in his book, Like a Flowing River, his first book I ever read which remains a favourite of mine to this day. He said

I want to be a writer, not an engineer who writes.

So, a writer I am trying to be now.

Which brings us all the way to last year, where I entered Mass Comm hoping to major in Journalism. So your question, why do I write, and what inspires me, is basically this: I've kept silent for twenty years of my life. Now I realise that I have something to offer the world, and that is why I write. I am inspired by conversations that I have with people, random happen-chances that occur in my life that I know are caused by a Divine Hand.

A friend said yesterday, that "I feel like, most of my life I've been living in a dream." And I can really understand that. I can't tell you how sweet it is, that I am actually living, not surviving. I am really breathing, for the first time in my life. I just want to say that, God has been good, and while I never actively sought my direction, He just gave me a nudge and a wink into the right direction, making sure to unlock doors and all I had to do was step through it.

As to my future, there's this lesson that I just learned yesterday. All this while, I've been hankering for an adventure, and I read The Way of the Wild Heart by John Eldrege without truly knowing what I really wanted. He wrote that the Holy Spirit is fiercely adventurous, and that He will bring you on the adventure. I realised that all this while, He has been riding shotgun in my life, and it is now the time to exchange seats with Him and let Him drive. It reminded me of a post I wrote, so long ago.

I hope some of this speaks to you, wherever you are. Not all of us find our way through random occurrences,  and, coming from one who's been lost and actually sometimes still find himself in a desert, I hope that you find your way. If you need a shoulder, an ear, or a drinking companion, my door is always open.
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