A little Christmas note

I started writing this post with a glimmer of bitterness, about people and about how this year has been a well-blend of turmoil and bliss for me. Albeit the rough road in that 300+ days I have had this year, I think it makes a significant difference if I will end the year in a right way.

December marks an exciting array of festivities for me: having my birthday in between the Christmas and the New Year makes me feel special in a way, I have the perfect day to live out a lot of fun, a renewal of personal goals and a chance to look back on how the year was and revision the day after, with a new projection of how life should be lived.

So let me shrug all those bad vibes and let me start again by saying thank you to all of my dear friends who, in spite of my imperfections, have seen my true value and worth. Must I say, there are thousands of people you meet and get to say hello with, but only a handful of them are the ones worth keeping. Lesson learned and it is about time to choose and keep those who are well-worthy. And for that, especially this Christmas, I would like to believe that you are my most celebrated God-given gift. And let me say Thank You by returning a genuine heart. Those who are separated from me by land and sea, those who I recently met but have gotten a piece of my heart and those that for the longest time have remained sincere in the friendship we have invested on, I don't mind spending a lifetime with people like you.

To more Christmas seasons with you guys, Cheers!

Louder than anything else

I am not the most silent person you’ll ever meet, but, my loudness knows a cloud in which I am at ease.

In the hype of fun and laughter, where mundane things wrap the hours of the day, while the world is busy living, that is when I am able to speak out the words my mind wanted to release so bad. The flow of thoughts remains fluid albeit filtered. 

But the sound of my silence is deafening which makes me remain mute- with words left unspoken. That is how I function. Just like any typical guy, I speak less when it is about the business that my heart has been tasked.

If you ask me why, this mechanism is enigmatic. I am amazed how I could shift to silence so easily the moment that my heart feels something. Maybe because I know in silence there is refuge, there is calmness that the opposite finds it hard to attain.  Maybe because I think the world just wouldn’t care how I feel, which is a good thing, because I am able to control what my mind thinks, something not everyone is capable of. Maybe because I think the more words that slip from our tongue, the more prone we are to speak of something that is appalling – an instance not very difficult when one is at the peak of emotions. And maybe because even if our emotions are creeping out of agitation or the mere boldness of anger, our silence tells us who we really are and what we are really made of. We are strong individuals; we are able to stop ourselves from bargaining our words to the world for whatever its worth. One thing I realized, we don't really, at all times, need to vent everything out. The world can only tolerate as much.

Because we know the value of silence even if the world stimulates us to just drop it. People may not understand, but we know, less is more.

So let my silence be my words as it is louder than anything else. 

That One Smile

10:30 AM.

It was thirty minutes past the hour of ten in the morning. The sun was beaming glaringly everywhere. I rushed to my building and swiftly glided across the room, so not to catch everyone’s attention. All I could hear were strokes of the keyboard. I was late. I was thirty minutes late. I told myself, ‘maybe everybody’s just a little early’.

I jumped onto my seat, pushed the lever up to elevate my position. I turned my laptop on and checked a pile of emails waiting to be read; each one was tagged ‘highly important’.

My morning was busy, I started the day with the usual routines I often do at work. I moved out from my desk and hopped into a meeting; it lasted two hours.

The Underdog

“Nobody deserves the second spot.” This is what my Philosophy professor said. “We all have a chance at the top, maybe not at the same areas, but somewhere out there, we all have a spot that we can claim our own.”

Everybody indeed has a spot. A place where we can gross the bragging rights for ourselves alone, defeating any other who owns their own spot somewhere, but not this, this is mine.

Defeat is part of the game. One wins, and the other loses. This is by default, the nature. But what does it take to win?

Winning is about knowing your game. It is about playing the right ball, at the right time, with the right attitude. It is about choosing what you can play best. Experience is a plus factor, but is not prerequisite to victory while luck is just a bonus.

Losing, doesn’t mean you failed. It only signifies either the game is not blueprinted for you or you’ve got some more warming up to do. But to know that you are about to lose should not stop you from playing the game. To have the wisdom for failure is a gift only the courageous ought to have and appreciate. To still play the game even though you are an inch close to failure nurtures your heart and soul the way only failure can. Humility is usually earned not compelled and this is the best prize in losing, because it is in humility that you are able to make yourself whole again. It is not in the fulfillment you get in winning that you are able to see your self-worth. What you have seen is just the ‘can’ part of you while self-worth is made up of what you ‘can’ and ‘cannot’. One is never whole without the emptiness to be filled upon.

Losing for the second spot isn’t losing after all. It just means either of the two things. Even though it doesn’t mean losing, nobody still deserves to be just number two. We need to find that spot. That spot which we can assert our own.

You could steal the game though, but you know that isn't right.

Playing a game that you know you are going to lose isn’t masochism nor hypocrisy. It is a pursuit or self worth fulfillment. So play anyway, and play it fair. You can win the first place or win the consolation form in wisdom. 

There are no underdogs. Just players in quest whether this spot was theirs from the start.  

YOLO!

It has been 21 years since I first saw light illuminating from the four corners of the room. I could barely see anything but the glares flashing through my eyelids.

The only sound I could hear were distressful cries from a woman in pain while another woman was chanting in sermon saying ‘push!’.

That was the moment I was born (although the cries and the flashing lights are a little bit fabricated, of course), and the moment that everything turned to be a written script just like in the movies. Like most kids, I have grown up in the premises of a to-do checklist. I was inducted not upon a second thought in a life-long sketch I have never dreamt while I was a little boy – I wanted to be a doctor, a scientist, an architect and even a singer. None of those seem too feasible. I did not end up loathing; although I made sure that the world understood how wishful and eager I am to have a choice of my own, it was my future after all.

Tick Tock

Tick tock. 

I stared at the watch strapped on my wrist to see how swiftly that second hand moves. I have been stuck in traffic for the last forty-five minutes. I glanced at the window, only to figure that home is still another twenty five minutes away from where I am.

It could have been just fifteen minutes if it were not for the slow-pace motion. Ah, traffic.

I lamented it. I regret every significant amount of time I put to waste whenever I get to spend the time in a halt, unproductively waiting for the long drive to end. All I was left was a moment to stare at the blank faces of those who are seated around me.

Intriguing. I wonder what thoughts are penetrated in their silence and stillness, while we are all caught up in an inescapable moment – there were nowhere else to go, nothing else to do.

If a man is summoned to a state of waiting, of inactivity, how does the human mind work? Does it take all the activeness the body ought to do? What is then the instinctive thought that the mind ponders? Or is there such? If there is, is it relative?