Hello again

I've never been able to fill an entire journal. I've started each of my journals with good intentions. Intentions to be honest and consistent. After every entry, I'd feel a sense of pride and accomplishment and think to myself, "that felt good. I should do it more often." Kind of like going to the gym.

Although I've been the busiest I've ever been in my entire life the past couple of years, I can't definitively say that my schedule is the only thing keeping me from writing. Writing is hard. It's scary. It's like opening up a can of worms. Once I write something, it means I've acknowledged it--it's real. Of course the times I'm most prompted to write are the times when I have things on my mind, burdens on my shoulder. I don't feel an urge to write when life is smooth sailing.

I used to be scared of uncertainty. I still am actually, but not as much. That's because certainty has also become scary to me. When the future is unknown, there is still hope. There is still imagination. There is room. When things are certain, it is comforting on one hand but much less potentially glamorous on the other.

When I was younger, I thought I wanted to act. The idea of pretending to be someone else in a controlled setting where there is a narrated beginning, middle, and end. What's not to like? Because maybe I am afraid of being myself. Afraid of discovering things about myself. What if I don't like the person I am? What if I'm not good enough? What if I'm destined to be mediocre? What if I have this flaw or that fear?

I feel like I've lived many lives already in this lifetime. Yet, I feel like I'm on the verge of turning the corner on another chapter. One can only hope. I can't keep feeling numb anymore.

March 30th, 2010

"...What is a man,⁠

If his chief good and market of his time

Be but to sleep and feed?

A beast, no more.

Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,

Looking before and after, gave us not

That capability and godlike reason⁠

To fust in us unused."

-William Shakespeare, Hamlet

44 years ago..

"The richer we have become materially, the poorer we become morally and spiritually. We have learned to fly in the air like birds and swim in the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple art of living together as brothers."

-Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  December 11, 1964

Journeys: Speedracer

"Have you been working a lot? You look tired."

Never the words I like to hear. From anyone. Especially the lady that does my hair. "Uh, yeah, yeah..." I mumbled, "Busy." 

Maybe she was just repeating what I had told her earlier--that the reason I hadn't come to see her more frequently in the past 6 months wasn't because I was using another hair stylist, but just simply because I haven't had the time. Maybe her eyesight is just bad. I mean after all, she isn't exactly the youngest gal on the block if you know what I'm saying. 

Okay. Alright, okay. I looked tired because I was tired. Physically. Mentally. Emotionally. Spiritually. I sped through 2008 on overdrive. Running towards the bright future? More like, running away from a past that's still sprinkled throughout my mind. Creating distance, making new friends, joining new activities, establishing new routines, shedding the old...one piece at a time. 

It's funny how life does that to you...with each experience you go through, you gain something...something called perspective. After each blow, each loss, each disappointment, each failure, you sure don't walk away empty-handed. It's too easy to just forget and move on. You get a couple of Hey-Thanks-For-Playing prizes. Maybe it's a slice of humble pie. Maybe it's a newfound sense of appreciation for something or someone. Maybe it's a "Well, now I know" kind of attitude. It may even be thicker skin or a stronger self-defense mechanism. Whatever it is, we're not quite the same as we were before. For most of us, not only do we gain something new, we also begin accumulating something old called baggage. Souvenirs, if you will. 

I close my eyes. I'm ready. I'm so ready. For nights like these, for nights when I sit in my room and breathe slowly, so that I feel my heart beating, sometimes aching. So that it doesn't escape me for even a minute that I am very much alive. That each moment of my life was indeed real and it all happened in its rightful place in history--my history. And it's nights like these, that even though I often only mention the down times, I feel some sort of satisfaction knowing that all of it is mine. They're my memories, good and bad, and no one can take them away from me. They're my life experiences, my stories. 

And that's when I start to realize that the past can't hurt me anymore. I look in the rearview mirror and see things pop up once in a while and I might flinch, but then I realize it slowly fades away into the background. I might not forget, and I might not lose those souvenirs, but I'm not held captive anymore either. I can now enjoy inner peace, smile, and dream again. 

   

In reality, I've only have 2 really rough patches in my life. I've been incredibly blessed, I truly have, but I've also had to learn some tough lessons during those rough patches. 

Maybe those are really blessings too. 

Looks like I may not need to be in such a rush anymore. But just to be safe, I'll make sure to catch some extra zzz's before I go to another hair appointment.

-SL

Fwd:RE:RE: (no subject)

"Have you been walking on a surface that's uncertain

Have you helped yourself to everything that's empty

You can't live

This way too long

There's more than this

More than this

Have you been standing on your own feet too long

Have you been looking for a place where you belong

You can rest

You will find rest

Have you been holding on to what this world has offered

Have you been giving in to all these masquerades, it will be gone

Let this old life crumble

Let it fade

Let this new life offered be your saving grace

Let this old life crumble

Let it fade"

-Jeremy Camp "Let it Fade"

Do you ever feel like the world is too loud sometimes? It seems like everyone is shouting, hoping that their shouts are louder than the next person's. I don't think it hit me until just now, but I am completely overwhelmed by the over-saturation of media in my life. The economy, the presidential campaigns, the propositions. I am inundated with how many hundreds of points the Dow has gone up one day and back down the next. I can't drive a single mile without hearing Vote Yes on Number X on the radio and simultaneously passing by a yard with Vote No on Number X sign. Then there's McCain this, Obama that. It's everywhere, every moment, and I'm not saying these are not real and relevant issues because of course they are, but I am simply just overwhelmed. 

Lately I've been overwhelmed with other things as well, mainly just my daily routines and responsibilities. Obviously I've not had a chance to update my blog, much less even remember the fact that I have a blog. Yet beyond all these things that are happening all around me, I'm thinking about my own life, my own journey. The song above really captures what is going on in my heart/mind. 

As I considered the questions asked in the song, and as I self-diagnosed the over-saturation of media in my life, a word popped in my head loud and clear: solitude. So then, obviously, I googled the word "solitude" and found this article:

Solitude vs. Loneliness by Hara Estroff Marano

"As the world spins faster and faster--or maybe it just seems that way when an email can travel around the world in fractions of a second--we mortals need a variety of ways to cope with the resulting pressures. We need to maintain some semblance of balance..."

"Otherwise we feel overloaded, overreact to minor annoyances and feel like we can never catch up. As far as I'm concerned, one of the best ways is by seeking, and enjoying, solitude.

From the outside, solitude and loneliness look a lot alike. Both are characterized by solitariness. But all resemblance ends at the surface.

Loneliness is a negative state, marked by a sense of isolation. One feels that something is missing. It is possible to be with people and still feel lonely.

Solitude is the state of being alone without being lonely. It is a positive and constructive state of engagement with oneself. 

Solitude is a time that can be used for reflection, inner searching or growth or enjoyment of some kind. 

Solitude suggests peacefulness stemming from a state of inner richness. It is a means of enjoying the quiet and whatever it brings that is satisfying and from which we draw sustenance.

Solitude is refreshing; an opportunity to renew ourselves. In other words, it replenishes us. 

Solitude gives us a chance to regain perspective. It renews us for the challenges of life." 

I think I'm ready for some solitude...

Journeys: Here comes the bride...

I had just finished brushing my teeth and was getting ready to go to bed when I heard my mom call my name. I just told her a second ago how tired I was--what did she want now? Apparently, my parents' wedding video is now available on DVD, courtesy of Costco's wonderful services. So I sat down and watched...in amazement and slight horror.

It was quite amusing to see my parents and relatives with their big hair, in their 80's outfits (which is totally in now, by the way.) My dad looked like he was too cool for school (Ha, OK dad..). I saw my cousin Danny, who was a little kid, and now he's 30 and getting married next month. Crazy. What really struck me--the main reason I even thought of writing this entry--was my mom. Growing up, I've always believed that I was the complete opposite of my mom. She had health issues as a child; I was a perfectly healthy child. She did not participate in sports; I absolutely love playing/watching sports. She's very girly; I'm not as much. Anyway, you get the point. When I was a kid, I was extremely close to my mom. I thought my dad was a meanie. My mom and I went shopping after school, and I always deemed her my "favorite" parent. Then somewhere along the way, we grew apart, because I (was a teenager) and began being very critical of her. Why aren't you like the other moms? Why do you always do this/that? Ugh, you don't understand me at all! Like seriously, why can't she be like that Gilmore mom? Or at least someone who's nice and bakes warm apple pies. Anyway, then high school came, along with her reminding (bugging) me about studying, piano, etc etc, which made me resent her even more. As a child I adored her, but as an adolescent, I questioned and critized her. How could she say something like that? How could she think something like that? I even went as far as to tell her that, had we been classmates in another world/lifetime, I wouldn't be her friend. (I meant to say it in a mean way, but I realized I just end up sounding really immature). I found that as I got older, I often told myself--I don't want to be like her when I grow up. This is what I'm going to do differently, as a mom/wife/whatever. This is how I'm going to be different. 

So this brings us to the climax of the story. I was absolutely stunned when I saw her in the video because something was oddly familiar. I realized right away that it was familiar because I saw myself in her mannerisms. I couldn't believe it. Her voice even sounded like mine, which was crazy, because her voice now doesn't sound anything like mine now. My mom, who I've always thought as a complete opposite person from me, was on that tv screen, at age 28, acting and sounding like me. I'm like my mom? Go figure.

I'm not so different...I'm not so special. I think maybe every generation thinks they are something really great, they scoff at the old-timers, laughing at how out-of-date they are, how uncool they were. But we forget...we're just one season, one batch, just like all the other ones that have come before us. We may be different, but we ain't that different. I was born and raised here; my parents weren't. We have a culture gap, age gap, heck--even language gap. Yet, perhaps I am not so different from them. After all, I am part my mom, part my dad. I can't escape that. We've learned in our classes that we study history because it's the story of our past, and our past is often what dictates our future. 

I mentioned in my first or second entry that writing for me, as it is for many, is kind of a journey. It's a process of self-discovery and finding out your own identity, which is something that I believe keeps evolving. Watching my parent's wedding video was funny, but it struck another chord as well: how it relates to me. It also reminds me not to be so critical of my parents. They've aged so much since the time of their wedding, they've battled through so much since then, and life just goes by way too fast. Someday, that'll be me on the DVD (if those haven't gone obsolete by then), and it'll be my kids seeing a little bit of me in them. 

"To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child. For what is the worth of human life, unless it is woven into the life of our ancestors by the records of history?" -Cicero.

Letters to You: Better Days

Dear J,

Sometimes, especially on days like today, I get the feeling that life is kind of like Minesweeper. We're faced with a grid of blank squares, and we carefully choose a square at a time, hoping we don't click on a mine. 

Specifically, I'm talking about tragedies hitting close to home. Growing up, I've heard of things happening, but always a few degrees separated from me. Post-high school these "things" crept a degree closer, and post-college they tiptoed just that much closer. Just like Minesweeper, these terrible things always seem to catch you by surprise. 

Do you know why I hate cliches? I hate cliches because by definition they are phrases that are overused, yet they are only overused because they are actually true. Thus,  there's usually no way around using them because the words say it like it is. What a Catch 22. 

I didn't know him very well, like you did, but it's still all I can think about right now. It hit me that he and I may not have had that much in common, but we all share one thing: our humanity. So while I don't know his personal circumstances, I know what it's like to be in a dark place...a place I was sure no one else could ever comprehend, devoid of hope and meaning. A place where pain choked out the other emotions like weeds did to plants in a garden. A place that screamed, "It will never be okay." Was any of it rational? Most likely not, but when are we ever rational when it comes to our own lives, our heart, our thoughts, and our emotions? But I was able to get out of that place. He didn't. That's what is so heartbreaking--to see someone lose that battle. 

When something like this happens, I get so upset that everything on reality tv nowadays portrays such a superficial life. Let's be honest: Reality makes reality tv look trivial and shallow. But at the same time, I am more guilty than anyone for watching because at the end of the day, sometimes reality is too overwhelming that I watch fake reality to trick my mind into thinking that life could be so effortless and serious-problem free. 

I pray for true peace and comfort for you and anyone and everyone who had a part in his life.

-SL

 

"And you ask me what I want this year

And I try to make it kind and clear

Just a chance that maybe we'll find better days

Cause I don't need boxes wrapped in strings

And designer love and empty things

Just a chance that maybe we'll find better days

So take these words

And sing out loud

Cause everyone is forgiven now

Cause tonight's the night the world begins again

I need someplace where we could live

And that's only something You can give

And that's faith and peace and trust while we're alive

And the one poor child who saved this world

And there's probably 10 million more who probably could

If we all just stopped and said a prayer for them

I wish everyone was loved tonight

And somehow stop this endless fight

Just a chance that maybe we'll find better days

So take these words

And sing out loud

Cause everyone's forgiven now

Cause tonight's the night the world begins again"

-"Better Days" Goo Goo Dolls

"And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." -Philippians 4:7