creative experimentation: pages from a diary no.1

what if everything you ever wanted or needed was right in front of you?

it's been a long time since i've felt so fired up.

for the first time in a very long time, i feel like oh.my.goodness. this is how things are supposed to be. this is where i am supposed to be.

over the last few weeks, i've made some bold choices. (choices that were also fueled by the privilege of having a lot of time + guidance to do a lot of soul-searching + reflecting... cosmic / divine intervention, perhaps?)

i decided to stop choosing the cheap easy way out of not rocking the boat, of settling for 'normal'. i decided that i want instead the other kind of easy - the quality kind of easy -
where i stop trying so hard to make sure i have it all figured out,
where i stop fighting against the current,
where i stop letting myself be pulled in all different directions,
where i stop being afraid to make decisions because i want to keep all my options open,
and where i tell myself that all that is just not worth it, and walk away.

because i have better things to do with my energy. and because in saying no to all that, i'm saying yes to grace, and yes to trusting.

yes to trusting that here is exactly where i am supposed to be. me is exactly who i am supposed to be. this is exactly what i am supposed to be doing. i don't have to try so hard all the time.

i've had conversation after conversation this week - and like a broken record, i find the words of my story spilling out from within. words filled with so much life, so much passion, so much intensity that even listening to myself, i go, whoa, who is this girl?!? in my head.

over and over again, i've been telling people - i used to have it all figured out. graduate, get the master's degree, get married at 24, be my own boss, open a coffeehouse, write a book, freelance + travel the world. that was my big brilliant plan for life, and i was not going to give it up at any cost.

then life happened. i fell in and out of love more times than you would think necessary for me to learn that the kind of love that makes you want to take that leap into marriage doesn't come easy. i got a scholarship and ended up working in the last place i ever imagined i'd be, at a 9-5 corporate job. and to my 16-year old self who set all those goals for myself, right now, i probably don't look like i'm on track towards achieving them.

yet i've never felt this liberated in my life.

through a combination of factors over the past week - a series of soul-searching conversations with friends, reading books like the purpose driven life and the firestarter sessions, and attending a personal development workshop and doing a series of reflective exercises at work - it's like the lights came on for me.

we did this activity during the workshop to help us discover our values - the key base factors that drive everything we do. and surprisingly, mine wasn't about travel or creativity or having a freelance career or all these things i used to think were super important for me to live a happy, fulfilled life.

i discovered that the reason i wanted all those things was ultimately being driven by a deeper desire for other things.

the reason travel is so important to me is because it represents variety. but i would rather live in one place while having a variety of experiences than travel around the world doing the same things - like flying from one business meeting to another, and being stuck in similar-looking meeting rooms, hotels, and business class lounges.

the reason having a freelance career is so important to me is because for me that represents freedom, and choices. but i might not necessarily have freedom if i'm a freelancer struggling to pay my bills. and conversely, i could be employed but in a position where i'm given many opportunities and choices. so it really boils down to having the power of choice - and the freedom of feeling that whatever i'm doing, i am not compromising on who i am.

the reason freedom and choices are so important to me is because ultimately, i want the freedom of choice - to live up to my fullest potential, without expectations or obligations holding me back, or feeling that i need to conform to the status quo.

when it comes down to it, that one thing that drives my life is this: the desire to be sure that whatever choice i make is the absolute best. one of the saddest stories i've ever heard is of walt disney's friend, art linkletter, who was driving with him through the orange orchard that would become disneyland when the idea for the theme park first hit disney. walt disney invited art to partner with him to build disneyland - but he couldn't see the potential of it. years later, as he walked through that former orchard that they drove past, now disneyland, he thought of the millions and millions of dollars he had lost because he missed the opportunity to be a part of walt disney's dream.

that's what drives my life. whatever i'm doing, i want to know - this is it. this is 100% the best thing i can be doing with my life right now. right now it might mean giving up the comfort and security of a stable relationship so i can focus on working towards a vision i believe in. 10 years later, it might mean giving up an incredible career because my kids are the most important thing to invest in. whatever it is, i realised i don't care so much what i do - as long as i know for sure that whatever i'm doing is not second best.

the moment i realised that, it was like a lightbulb went off in my head - no, a million lightbulbs - and a blaze ignited somewhere deep within. so this is why i've made the choices i've made and given up the 'dreams' i've given up. yes, where i am may not be where i expected to be, but that doesn't mean i'm compromising on my values or my dreams.

i never expected i would be 22, not be in a relationship that's headed towards marriage, be working at a corporate job - and not only being okay with it, but loving where i am (but that's another long story for another post). i'm glad i didn't win that trip around the world. i'm glad things didn't work out the way i wanted them to. otherwise i wouldn't have discovered how much i love what i'm actually doing right now.

yes, things haven't quite turned out as i wanted. i wanted good. but what if in letting go of good, in giving up the desperate, frantic search for it... i allow room for amazing to rush in? what if maybe i don't have to chase an amazing life but i actually need to slow down, so it can catch up with me?

what if it's already in front of me?

what if i'm as free as i choose to be?

what if?

"I'm going for revolutionary, thank you. Not warm - hot. Not bright - blazing." -Danielle LaPorte

"You know what's easy? Dreaming. Hanging out with people who make you feel good. Laughing. Resting. Being passionate. There is nothing as easy as being inspired." -Danielle LaPorte

"Jonathan Livingston Seagull . . . was no ordinary bird. Most gulls don’t bother to learn more than the simplest facts of flight— how to get from shore to food and back again. For most gulls, it is not flying that matters, but eating. For this gull, though, it was not eating that mattered, but flight. More than anything else, Jonathan Livingston Seagull loved to fly." -Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

nobody's someone (or it's okay to be you)

it's been some time since i've wrote properly in here. more than a month has passed since my last proper post, and actually being able to find some quiet time to type in here is a refreshing change ... anddd wait, that's the phone ringing!

...okay, we're back.

i guess it took being forced to write down my thoughts and reflections (as part of an intensive staff training programme we're doing company-wide) to remind me how much i missed this whole reflective process. just the simple act of taking a few minutes in a day to stop, block out everything, and just clear the mess of thoughts in my head and put it down in words is incredibly therapeutic.

“When people don’t express themselves, they die one piece at a time. You’d be shocked at how many adults are really dead inside—walking through their days with no idea who they are, just waiting for a heart attack or cancer or a Mack truck to come along and finish the job. It’s the saddest thing I know.” -Laurie Halse Anderson, Speak

it's not only therapeutic - taking the time to reflect allows me to digest and appreciate the many things that have been happening, and also to gain perspective on where i am today. sometimes life feels like being tossed about on waves in a storm. but reminding myself of who i am, where i came from, where i'm going is like going back to the steering wheel and navigational instruments and knowing that as long as i keep a firm grip on what matters, i'll sail through the storm okay.

“It takes a certain ingenuous faith - but I have it - to believe that people who read and reflect more likely than not come to judge things with liberality and truth.” -A.C. Grayling, The Heart of Things: Applying Philosophy to the 21st Century

one of my reasons excuses for not spending as much time reflecting as i used to / ought to is simply that the past half a year has flown by. last month marked an entire year of working full time with the company. since then, so much has changed from where i first started out, and i don't think the person i was a year ago would recognise who i am today!

since i first moved into this exciting new start-up at the beginning of this year, it's been like running at top speed on a never-ending treadmill - incredibly demanding and exhausting, but also incredibly exhilarating when it hits you that you're breaking all your previous records and going further than you ever thought you were capable of - and you're still running.

it didn't fully sink in how much things had changed until a conversation with some good, long-time friends... and some good ol' reflective journalling. i realised that every thing i wanted and said i would do a year ago has changed. somehow, i blinked, a year passed, and from having everything figured out i went to not having a clue about what i want. BAM. it's scary when that realisation hits you. but at the same time, it's incredibly liberating.

in the iconic words of tyler durden, it's only after we've lost everything (all our preconceived notions about how things 'should' be, our aspirations, our plans) - that we're free to do anything.

from where i'm standing right now, anything could happen. from my horizon, the possibilities look pretty limitless. all of a sudden, i find myself thinking that maybe it's okay to not have everything figured out, and take things one step at a time. that's going to be a little hard for a compulsive planner like me, who has planned her life in advance since i was 15... but i'll make it.

it's taken a lot of internal wrestling, but i've finally accepted that i'm not superwoman. i can't do everything i want to. i am, like the rest of the human race, limited to the same 24 hours each day. and i've decided that instead of wasting my energy trying to figure tomorrow out, i need to live today. if i try to juggle what i have, while trying to grab on to more plates that may not be mine to juggle - sooner or later, something's got to give.

a friend told me, 'crys, your achievements surpass most people your age. you have amazing drive and if your doing all these things for the right reasons, that's great. but if you're always doing it to please or impress others, or to 'deserve' things, crys, that's just tiring.'

i've known this for a long time - that i'm a people-pleaser and i always worry about whether i'm living up to people's expectations, worry about what people think of me, or worry about whether people like me. but hearing the brutal truth from someone else - to your face - is always a good wake-up call.

she told me, 'crys, you don't have to be somebody's someone. you can just be you. there's nothing wrong with that. there are people who care about you for who you are. not what you can offer them or what you can do for them.'

i know those are simple words. ridiculously simple, actually. but hearing it from someone else was liberating. there's enough inspiring quotes and motivational books out there telling us to be who we were created to be. to be unique and all that jazz. but hearing a close friend say, 'you can just be you' - was powerful. it was like being officially given permission. permission to stop trying to be someone else's version of perfect. permission to go be amazing and change the world, but for the right reasons. permission to BE, not do, or try.

so to close, here's a little challenge for you: who's someone you know who needs to hear those words? be the person to say it. or if you're needing to hear those words, i could type it out here: it's okay to be you. but that's not going to be good enough. so seek out the right people whom you know will say that to you. they might not say it the way you want to hear it, but i'm pretty sure everyone has someone who cares enough to say that to you. give people a chance.

all that we do, and are, is our religion

“Religion is, in reality, living. Our religion is not what we profess, or what we say, or what we proclaim; our religion is what we do, what we desire, what we seek, what we dream about, what we fantasize, what we think - all these things - twenty-four hours a day. One's religion, then, is ones life, not merely the ideal life but the life as it is actually lived."

"Religion is not prayer, it is not a church, it is not theistic, it is not atheistic, it has little to do with what white people call "religion." It is our every act. If we tromp on a bug, that is our religion; if we experiment on living animals, that is our religion; if we cheat at cards, that is our religion; if we dream of being famous, that is our religion; if we gossip maliciously, that is our religion; if we are rude and aggressive, that is our religion. All that we do, and are, is our religion.”

 -Jack D. Forbes, Columbus and Other Cannibals: The Wetiko Disease of Imperialism, Exploitation and Terrorism

Midnight memories

I have major commitment issues. So I wrote a post two years ago to remind me of what I'd learned every time I felt like running away from commitment. Tonight, as I stumbled across that post while browsing through my old blog, I realised how desperately I needed to read it.  

I know it seems like I don't, but I think of you every now and then, and wonder how different our lives could have been.

If we had met at a different time. If we had not met at all. 

If we had done more. Or less.

If we had said more. Or kept silent.

Sometimes the memories hit me like a flood and in moments like that, I want to squeeze my eyes shut and make them all go away.

But try as I might to imagine or pretend things didn't happen like they did, 

we did meet, when we did. We did do, what we did. We did say, what we said. 

And there's nothing that can be done about that.

It would be easier to just look at all the things that went wrong, because it makes it easier to leave behind the memories that way. People do that all the time. 

But it'd be a lie to say there were no good parts, no parts of 'us' that were magic. And for those people that don't seem to 'move on' - it's all those parts they can't shake off.

See, here's the thing you've taught me, that many people don't get. 

It was not us, as in, the combination of you and me, that made it magic.

It was 'us' - as in, the 'us' that happens when two people decide to take a risk, a leap of faith, and let someone else in unselfishly and unreservedly, that made it magic. And if that's what it takes to make magic, then it takes the opposite of that - selfishness and defensiveness and doubt - to creep in and steal it away. 

And if we're honest with ourselves, we both let it creep in.

But we wouldn't have known that, would we, if things didn't happen the way we did. Because human nature is like that. We don't know what we have till it's gone. But if that's the way it works, then perhaps the only way to not waste the pain is to make sure, when we get a second chance, that we never take it for granted. We never waste a single moment or a single day being thankful for a chance to love unselfishly all over again, to believe in the best in another person.

And maybe that way, the memories are not so painful to look back on. Because in the mess of emotions and hurt and betrayal and neglect grows a small, but resilient seed of hope, of grace, and of second chances, fertilized by the decay of wasted chances.

You can't erase the memories. But you can make them worth it.