This trip home, I got to meet up with a lot of old friends doing different things with their lives, just starting out with their first jobs. It intrigued me to hear tales of what it is they actually do, because it bore stark contrast to my daily routine at work.
In Melbs, I was surrounded by mostly university students or doctors every day, and I live with a Bible college student and a teacher. Being back home, I got to speak with a lawyer, a psychologist, an event planner, an NGO worker, an engineer and a teacher, amongst even more doctors.
I don't know what it is about 'growing up' that has been on my mind so much these past few days, the very thought of becoming an adult in this world with a unique identity of your own.
Being a twenty-something, it's been said that this is the time to make mistakes and discover who you really are; a time to take risks and sail new oceans for time will pass, and responsibility will grow. It's exciting and wonderful to finally be old enough to decide where your next step will be, but immensely scary as well.
And yet, after all these years of thinking I was so sure I knew who I was and what my identity is, at twenty-something with a stable career and dreams in my back pocket, I somehow feel I'm not so sure anymore.
I guess.. I'm still trying to figure that out.
Unless it's not about discovery, but rather finding the courage to create yourself - to unashamedly stand for the things you believe in, to boldly listen to the call of your passions, to chase them, and to rise again after every set back with determination.
...
In the past two weeks, we've talked about relationships, family, careers and aspirations.. and I often paused to wonder, how different my life would have been if I had made different choices along the way.
What if I stayed in KL to study instead of going abroad?
What if I took a year off?
What if I met different groups of friends along the way?
What about all those times my answer was a no instead of a yes?
What if this? What if that?
...
One thing is for sure though, I am here now.
The real question is, where will the sum of more choices lead me next?
...
"Sometimes I can feel my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I am not living."
- Jonathan Safran Foer
In Melbs, I was surrounded by mostly university students or doctors every day, and I live with a Bible college student and a teacher. Being back home, I got to speak with a lawyer, a psychologist, an event planner, an NGO worker, an engineer and a teacher, amongst even more doctors.
I don't know what it is about 'growing up' that has been on my mind so much these past few days, the very thought of becoming an adult in this world with a unique identity of your own.
Being a twenty-something, it's been said that this is the time to make mistakes and discover who you really are; a time to take risks and sail new oceans for time will pass, and responsibility will grow. It's exciting and wonderful to finally be old enough to decide where your next step will be, but immensely scary as well.
And yet, after all these years of thinking I was so sure I knew who I was and what my identity is, at twenty-something with a stable career and dreams in my back pocket, I somehow feel I'm not so sure anymore.
I guess.. I'm still trying to figure that out.
Unless it's not about discovery, but rather finding the courage to create yourself - to unashamedly stand for the things you believe in, to boldly listen to the call of your passions, to chase them, and to rise again after every set back with determination.
...
In the past two weeks, we've talked about relationships, family, careers and aspirations.. and I often paused to wonder, how different my life would have been if I had made different choices along the way.
What if I stayed in KL to study instead of going abroad?
What if I took a year off?
What if I met different groups of friends along the way?
What about all those times my answer was a no instead of a yes?
What if this? What if that?
...
One thing is for sure though, I am here now.
The real question is, where will the sum of more choices lead me next?
...
"Sometimes I can feel my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I am not living."
- Jonathan Safran Foer
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