Limbo

Image from here.

There is a churning feeling in the pit of my stomach, this in spite of the realization that I have spent a over 5 months living life as a grownup, what with the job and the not-too-shabby salary and the grad school units even.

I tend to flip-flop with the way I feel about my life now. At times, it feels pleasant (or is it dulled down?), and then I find myself subdued at the thought that I am finally growing comfortable with my life.

And then there are moments like these - when I am faced with all the things I am scared to do, like leaping really big. Like letting go of what little ties I have made in order to try for a bigger thing. Like taking a risk.

All of the pleasant feelings I have had about my life so far have felt like settling down all of a sudden. And not in a good way. They feel like giving up more than anything. On myself. On my dreams of finding a version of me that is better than this. I want to swim away, but I can't.

I want to absolutely love the life I am living. I want to not merely be able to tolerate it.

Rest

Rest by Pearce Highsmith (Image from here.)

I finally have gotten to the point where I realize how vital rest is. When I was much younger, weekends were very much restless days, spent arguing with myself (and my parents) because I wasn't making the most out of it. I felt then that weekends were best spent outside, doing things and meeting people and finding someone to fall in love with and things like that. Now, on the weekends, I am just incredibly happy when I get to rest -- and by rest I mean literally doing nothing, lying down, breathing in and out, having nothing on the agenda except to watch movies, read, eat and sleep.

I did just that this whole weekend. I was supposed to study for midterms, but after I found out that my midterm was pushed back, I settled into the weekend whole-heartedly. I lounged out on the lanai and sipped my coffee slowly, while I read cookbooks. I watched a lot of movies - classics and fluffy ones alike. A lot of movies. I watched two last Friday, four yesterday, and a sprinkling of tv shows in between that. It doesn't sound like much, but it was glorious.

This Sunday morning was spent eating a lazy breakfast with my brother, and then writing this entry while listening to the Garden State soundtrack, which is awesome. Can't believe I didn't discover it till this weekend.

There isn't much more to my weekend than that, but it was just what the kind of weekend that I've been praying for for a long time. Thank God!

What's your idea of a great weekend?

Bathers at Rest by Paul Cezanne (Image from here.)

does it matter if you know why?

Image from here.

This evening, my mom, dad, and I went to watch my brother's choir (the Ateneo College Glee Club) in concert. It was their return concert after touring Europe for over a month, mainly because they competed for the title in the European Grand Prix.

During the concert, one of the choir members shared his thoughts as they prepared to compete -- the feeling was familiar, he said, because he had competed for the title with the choir nearly 10 years ago. Both times, the grand prize title eluded them.

Upset, he shared how he had to ask himself why; why did they keep on losing? Why then, why now? And then, he said something which struck a chord in me. Does it really matter if you know why? 


In the end, he said, it mattered more how hard they had worked to compete for that title again. It mattered that they did it anyway, win or lose.

Those words, along with the great music of the choir, made me think of the "whys" in my life. Why I stuck to some things and quickly abandoned others. Why I felt the way I did about many things and many people. Why I was placed in the circumstances I was in now.

Personally, at this point in my life, I find that the whys aren't as important as what I am doing about them, and how I am addressing them given what I have at my disposal.

As though by magic, I found myself stumbling over this favorite quote of mine by Rainer Maria Rilke, taken from Letters to a Young Poet. This pretty much sums up how I feel about the questions now.

One of my favorite quotes EVER.  Photo from here.

May we all live our way into the answers!

Questions

why is it that the only time i appear to not be socially inept is when i pretend i am someone other than myself?

why is that when i go someplace, there is no trace of my being there other than the empty space i just left and the awkward silence that has been filled since my departure?

why am i a mystery even to myself?

in the words of leo gursky, "I knew I was different from them, and the difference hurt."