A Goose's Dream

난 난 꿈이 있었죠
버려지고 찢겨 남루하여도
내 가슴 깊숙히 보물과 같이 간직했던 꿈

혹 때론 누군가가
뜻 모를 비웃음 내 등뒤에 흘릴 때도
난 참아야 했죠 참을 수 있었죠
그날을 위해

늘 걱정하듯 말하죠
헛된 꿈은 독이라고
세상은 끝이 정해진 책처럼
이미 돌이킬 수 없는 현실이라고

그래요 난 난 꿈이 있어요
그 꿈을 믿어요.나를 지켜봐요
저 차갑게 서 있는 운명이란 벽앞에
당당히 마주칠 수 있어요

언젠가 나 그벽을 넘고서
저 하늘을 높이 날을 수 있어요
이 무거운 세상도 나를 묶을 순 없죠
내 삶의 끝에서
나 웃을 그날을 함께해요

Been listening to this song over and over again today. It's simply beautiful.
Here's the English translation:

I used to have a dream
Though thrown away and torn
and looks worn out
I kept it within my heart as if it was a treasure

Sometimes, though someone laughed at me
for an unknown reason
behind my back
I had to endure, I could endure
For that day…

You always tell me worriedly
That pointless dream is a poison
That this world is like a book, where the end is already written
That it is a reality that can’t be reversed

That’s right, I… I have a dream
I believe in that dream.
Just you watch me.
I can proudly confront
That coldly standing wall called fate.

Some day, I’ll climb over that wall
And fly high to that sky
Even this heavy world cannot bind me.
Let’s spend the day when I’ll laugh at the end of my life together…

You always tell me worriedly
That pointless dream is a poison
That this world is like a book, where the end is already written
That it is a reality that can’t be reversed

That’s right, I have a dream
I believe in that dream.
Just you watch me.
I can proudly confront
That coldly standing wall called fate.

Some day, I’ll climb over that wall
And fly high to that sky
Even this heavy world cannot bind me.
Let’s spend the day when I’ll laugh at the end of my life together…

The time I'm running out of

So here's practically how my day goes everyday:


I'd commute to the office every morning with train. In the train, I'd plug my ears with earphone and occupy my mind by reading my Google reader or catching up with latest news of the day through Twitter. While listening to the songs in my ear and reading all the news and articles, I'd start imagining myself getting off the train, chasing for a bus, sitting in there, getting off of it, walking to the building where my office is located, and I'd start thinking of whether I'd drink tea or coffee this morning, I'd start recollecting the taste of each, considering which would be the most proper for that morning. Sometimes, the train of thought would be cut off for a brief moment with the realization of the sight of trees running backwards or the roof of the houses that we're passing. For that brief moment I'd think, it's not the best sight in the world but it's lovely anyway, never fails to brighten my day. And then the train of thought resume with more and more tasks and plans for the day. 


When sitting on the bus, though it had been carefully pictured in my mind earlier that I'd keep listening to the songs played in my iPod along with some interventions from the street singers creating a nonsense unintelligible sounds in my ears, I'd do something else too. I'd pondering on whether to read a book or continue checking up  Twitter, which I usually end up doing both, interchangeably.


I'd watch the cars and motorcycles passing by next to me, and think maybe I'd better stop multitasking and just enjoy the sight for a while. I never really give much thought about why the sight of traffic can be something to be enjoy. While watching the busy traffic, my mind would start wandering around the office, at my cubicle to be precise. I'd thinking about turning the computer on, entering password, and while waiting for the computer to log on I think I'd go to the toilet to clean myself up, going to the office's pantry, searching for my mug in the cupboard, making myself a cup of coffee, and walked back to my desk with the computer already logged on.


Isn't it amazing that by the time I am there, sitting at my desk with the computer already logged on and ready to start the work, I'd think of  how this day would end. I'd type words and numbers, working on the report or whatever it is I'm working on, while thinking of what to read on my way home. I'd look outside the window and find a beautiful sight of drizzling rain and would start taking pictures, editing it, and posting it on Streamzoo. All the while thinking of drawing the pictures, wondering whether to just using MyPaint or coloring pencils. 


By the time I got on the bus for a two-hours trip going home, I don't only read what I have sort of planned earlier back in the office, but I also busy multitasking between checking my inbox, reading at least two pages of a book, and staring at the traffic outside.


I'm actually pretty busy aren't I? :D


Sometimes at such moment I'd think, I have to choose to do only one of these or I'd get home dead tired. And actually, I was tired already. So I'd usually end up plastering my face to the window, watching the traffic, or staring at the sky if it's not dark yet. It felt so relieving, actually. To sit still in silence, doing nothing, thinking of nothing, only silence occupy your head.  But it's hard to keep though. My mind has this tendency to think and over think everything and it's really difficult to tell it to be quiet. During the noisy conversation, I'd think of writing them down. It's been a good therapy for me actually. Only sometimes, I'd get too far by thinking of the opening sentences, what to focus, what to highlight, any pictures I could use, or perhaps I'd just draw something.


And believe me, when I finally draw something, while moving the pencil on my sketch book, my mind would wander around other things like what to draw after this, what about the previous idea I had in mind, when will I have time to draw them, should I buy another set of coloring pencils so I wouldn't have to use my daughters', and creating a plan for the upcoming weekend where I'd have my quiet time drawing. Or perhaps going to a book store to buy some stationery. Speaking of which, what about the books in my wish list. Or even, the books I haven't finished reading. And I'd start to mentally groan in frustration, oh so many things I want to do yet so little time. 


Thinking about it, actually I have managed to crammed quite a lot of things in my time. Aside from working nine to five, I still manage to read books and articles in my Google reader, update my blog, drawing, editing some photos, updating my Deviantart and Flickr, catching up with friends once in a while through Twitter and Facebook, having a conversation during dinner with my Mom and my daughter, and quite enough sleep. 


But why do I keep feeling like I don't have enough time? 


I always recognize the feeling of a meltdown. It usually happens when I don't have enough time with myself. Being an introvert, I now know that I was never made for a noisy life, and even if I have to live one, I know I'd have to set at least two hours every day to be alone to recharge, to release all the tensions that were built during the eight hours of interaction with other people. If I don't set aside some time for myself, I'd have the meltdown phase, and it could be very nasty. 


Now I've managed to squeeze a little time here and there to do things I want. But something is missing. Something is lacking. Something that feels clearer when it's late at night, when all the world is sleeping, and I'm close to sleeping either that I never really find out what is it because I'd fall asleep not long after, physically tired and mentally exhausted for the reason I don't understand. I have time to do things I like. Why should I feel exhausted?


Only recently I realized, that I don't set quite enough time to be with myself. I've been cramming my usual quiet time with too many activities. And while I think that might be a good thing, I have to question my motive as well. I think it started to become a problem when I start setting target like reading at least two pages of a book, drawing at least one in a week, posting at least three photos in a day, and so on. 


While target is important, and I know that I have to keep at least one blog post per day for the sake of keep writing and keep my sanity intact, I might have been violating the purpose of quiet time by cramming it with not only too many things, but also target to be accomplished. If my daily life at work has already full of targets and deadlines, perhaps I should not use the same principles with my quiet time. I might have violated the quiet time by doing things I like with the wrong spirit behind it. 


Things you like, they should be done with love, with the right amount of caring and gentleness, and less ambitions. I should stop filling up my sketch book every week and learn to let go, leave a sketch half finished when I feel exhausted, and visit it again next week. I have to learn to move on with another topic or another draft instead of forcing myself to struggle with one draft that is so difficult to finish. I now think that the reason it gets that difficult to finish is perhaps because my heart was not there, not at that time. 


Committing to finish the work is one thing. But I need to learn to choose. I can't do everything all at once. Well, maybe I can, but I'd loose the present time; the time I'm  having but ignoring by being too busy thinking and planning about the next time. The present time I'd failed to enjoy for having too focus on the result. I'd missed the joyful times feeling the pencil moving on the paper, watching the color filling up the white space inches by inches together with the movement of my hands. I'd missed the joyful times of playing with ideas, the process of unveiling thoughts and untying them into a form of sentences, the excitement of swimming with words, stringing them up one by one into sentences, watching my thoughts turning itself into a previously unknown form as the sentences progress into paragraphs.


I've read this article about a relentless mind and what to do with it. I think that's just what I've been having all this time. 


I was going home from work yesterday, feeling slightly heavy on my head and still tired of an emotional breakdown two days earlier. The commuter bus has high windows so the sights are limited to tree tops and clouds in the sky. I stared blankly at the sky at first, mind wandering to the news and articles I was planning to read but failed to because exhaustion took over me. Then the sight of the clouds rolled up, forming some kind of white soft tower in the sky started to get into me. I was amazed by how grand the sky is, how beautiful the clouds are, and how little yet so blessed I am to be sitting witnessing this miracle of the universe. I felt so happy and grateful, so much that I keep smiling even when I had to walk under the rain that suddenly pouring. 


It was one of my blissful quiet moments and actually, it's not that difficult to find. If only I let myself to be mindful, emptying my mind from all the thoughts of the next time, let quietness takes over, fully absorbing all the sights and the sounds around me in precious silence, wholeheartedly experiencing the now.

When all is fail, write

At least that's how it is with me. 


Writing has always been the best way for me to channel my restlessness. I'm one of those people with busy brain that never stops talking and processing thoughts, digging deeper and deeper into things, connecting and retrieving information and thoughts, and turning it over and over again inside the skull of my head. Sometimes, the thought it's playing with is not that important, often times, it's absolutely not important at all. But it doesn't seem to mind that I actually question my brain's judgment on making priorities. 


It's really tiring to hear all the talking inside my head. And for years I've been unconsciously developing a mechanism to shut them up by putting them down on paper (and by paper here I also mean a blank white page on computer screen_kind of paper look alike). I don't always indulge it though. Most of the time, I ignore the talking until they turn into some kind of a scream, or a cry. Then I'd force myself to sit still, face the blank page, and deal with them with true honesty that will only come out through writing.


It's never an easy process. The waiting phase, the phase where the thoughts start transforming themselves from thoughts to screaming thoughts, or crying thoughts, is painful. The heavy feeling in my chest, the restlessness, the constant looking back or looking aside diverting me from whatever it is I'm trying to do, whatever it is but writing, is annoying. After days, I'd feel incoherent and unable to focus. I'd spend almost thirty minutes just to write a simple email to a colleague. It's annoying the way they keep diverting your attention from the current moment you're in and pulling you back to somewhere, some time, where the thoughts dwell. 


What strikes me the most is, actually, how I never learn that it's a battle I'd never win.


I've always known it that those busy thoughts are not something I can ignore. In fact, they are actually something I have to follow and indulge, if I want to be at peace with myself. But I keep ignoring them, turning away from them, throwing promises that I'd visit them at proper times, proper occasion, proper mood, proper place. Hence my never ending restlessness.


In these past few days, I've been drowning with the feeling, unable to settle them down, but also failed to make myself to sit and disentangle the knotted thoughts inside my head. I've been refusing to say yes to them. I imagined myself, slightly upset, telling them to grow up and stop pestering me and solve their own problems, stop being so demanding because I have another life to tend to so they cannot expect me to always be there all ears and ready with pen and paper whenever they need me, and for God sake, they really need to shut up for a while and be quiet, how would they think I'd be able to understand what they said if they keep talking and talking, and really, haven't they heard about priority? 


As usual, feeling totally exhausted as a result of constant denial, I finally sit and wrote. I wrote, because I've tried reading, I've tried browsing for articles, listening to songs, watching TV, working, drinking coffee, daydreaming, staring at the rain, even sleeping. All failed. I have to admit that the only way I could calm them down is by writing them down. And bear the consequences of possible another spark of thoughts appearing along the way, ready to bloom into another screaming thoughts within the next few days, creating another restlessness within me, stuffing my chest until I finally give up and turn around and face them. And write again. 

incoherent

I went to work this morning with more than half of my heart was still left at home. I think I’ve left them somewhere close with my sketchbook and coloring pencils, near the unfinished drawing I started last night.

I try to calm down and prepare myself for the one and a half hour trip getting to the office. I put on my earphone, playing Putumayo playlist, hoping to sooth the restlessness in me. I sat myself at the last row in the bus, right next to a window. It’s my favorite place because it shields me from the chaos inside the too crowded bus. I turned my iPod volume to the max, and opened a book. I was distracted, but not that much to help me completely forget the restlessness.  After a while I finally gave up and closed the book, thinking that perhaps this is one of those moments where it’s better to be quiet and still, to let the busy brain stop talking for a while and let silence occupy your head.

At times like this, I cannot help but wonder. Have I been ungrateful with the life I’m having now? I ask myself the question over and over again while watching, from the window of the rusty bus, a number of street vendors running on the street, trying to get into the moving buses. In front of me was an old man I usually see wandering about at the train station piggybacking his adolescent retarded son. While passing the intersection, I caught a glimpse of a street singer standing at the pavement, watching the buses go by, looking disappointed. It seems they were also trying to get into the bus but failed to cross the street, hampered by a bunch of motorcycles.

I know and I’m sure that I’m far from being ungrateful. I’m more than glad that I have a place every day to go to work for. And every day I pray for those people I meet on the street, wishing a better life for them. But this restlessness, these voices calling from somewhere inside of me, is not something I can ignore. It’s getting more and more unbearable every day. It’s something I know I’d have to follow.

I wrote this post once I got the the office, still having no clear idea on how to deal with it. 

So dear people, sorry for giving you more clouds :)

I need a help here.

Misunderstood

Dear world,

This is one of those moments when punching a solid wall seems to be an appropriate, justified action, for the sake of sanity.

I can almost see myself listing down a few things as justifications before walking to the nearest wall here inside my house and land a punch wholeheartedly to it. Bruised knuckles are expected. But for a moment it felt like worth it. All the reasons I'd listed down, seemed to deserve the bruised knuckles. Just like the innocent walls deserve a punch, simply for standing there solid, calm and composed, unmoved by the struggling I'm having right in front of their faces. 

If, walls ever have faces.

The thing is, they don't. And that negates all the reasons I was about to list down earlier. And finally cancelled it because, well simply, because walls are innocent.

Dear world,

I never wish I'm not who I am now. I've learned to love being who I truly am, accepting the fact that I might have to live the rest of my life being misunderstood by people around me. 

To those who don't, I really thank you all. And I'm really grateful to God for letting me to have such people like you around me, though there aren't many of you out there.

To those who do, I don't blame you. You are just as innocent as the walls. You cannot be guilty for standing there solid and confident, believing what you believe and seeing the world through your eyes. It's your eyes anyway. You cannot possibly guilty either for being ignorant to the fact that there are other humankind seeing the world through different eyes. The same world, just through different eyes. Or, to be more precise, different from yours. 

Dear world, 

I know it's never about who's to blame. And I never wish for the world to be different. 

I just wish that it wouldn't hurt so much to be misunderstood.

the moral of the story?

I was having a really bad day at the office yesterday. Not that it's the first time. Looking back, that has always been the case with my job for the past six years: deadlines, crazy deadlines, friendly deadlines, I-understand-your-workload-but-sorry-what-else-can-I-do deadlines, chaotic environment filled with tension, people hurrying by to catch up with whatever it is running ahead of them, trying to get ahead of everything.


That was my introvert, HSP self talking.  


There are times when my less than 1% extrovert self (yes, I still believe that I actually have this, the test system just failed to recognize it) coming out and decided to take the front line, and see things rather differently. That it has always been a good place to work. That it's actually the best place to grow, full of challenges and experiences of new things you might never heard of before. That it's actually a place that will boost your confidence by taking you involved in big things, big scenarios, access to classified information, meeting important people. That those tensions, that chaotic environment, will be from time to time, filled with the sounds of people throwing jokes, laughter everywhere, victory scream over new business wins, friendly faces smiling over small unimportant things of our everyday lives.


I learn not to judge what my two sides of self see. They do have their positive and negative sides, though I am perfectly aware that I will always be gravitated to what I truly am: the introvert, the HSP, the unsent, the one that doesn't fit in. 


In some days, I can walk into the office calm, composed, collected, full of control of myself, ready to take any challenges offered by the day. In some days, I would walk in miserably, feeling frustrated by the chaotic environment, intimidated by deadlines that haven't even existed (yet). Yesterday was one of those days. With two deadlines waiting, the HSP in me that were on active mode started to panic. It wasn't a good condition and I collapsed, layer by layer, throughout the day. 


I finished my work for the day. Some of them. But I felt torn apart; my pride was torn apart, the idea I have about myself was challenged to the point of questioning my very existence in this world; am I just one of those passerby? One of the dying soul walking around the earth simply trying to make ends meet before the end comes and take away everything life is?


I spent the two hours going home trying to fight the tears I knew wouldn't be able to come out anyway. Just glistening moist at the corner of my eyes. My chest was full with emotions and my head was full with thoughts, both I have no control of. They were swirling, turning around, and I was so sure that I was going to cry last night. 


But then, not so far from my house, I saw some kids playing ular naga panjangnya. It's a traditional game I used to play when I was a little kid. I live in a suburban area, thus it is actually not uncommon to find children playing traditional games. But seeing those kids forming a row, singing and giggling while moving in a snake-like motion last night somehow brought a smile to my face. I suddenly thought of the days when I was one of those kids, singing and giggling under the moonlight. For a brief moment, I could feel the excitement I used to have while running around bare feet with my little friends in front of our houses. It was brief, but it was able to lift the heavy feeling off my chest. So last night, despite the intimidating day I had previously, I reached home with lighter heart and a smile on my face. And I'm really thankful for it.


I felt grateful how some things, are, comfortably, remains the same, especially within our heart. Now I see why.


So, dearest people, what is the moral of the story? I don't know. I don't think I've started this blog post with such a noble idea to give and moreover, to highlight a valuable lesson. At least not this time. I don't know what the moral of the story is, and I'm not planning to dig deeper into my brain to find out about it anytime soon. I started this blog post with a rather selfish intention, that is to let you know that I was having a bad day and unable to deal with it, I've let it ruining my day, but then I managed to came home smiling because of some kids playing ular naga panjangnya. 


Was it about finding the silver lining in the sky? Was it about having positive thought in your hardest times? Was it about finding peace within yourself? I don't know. 


I just remembered that when I opened the gate of my house last night, I sighed, and thinking, oh such an old wisdom, never fades in time. 


But what was it, really?




South Jakarta, in the middle of this chaotic place, while waiting for my research plan being reviewed

The "I" That Matters

I remember reading somewhere that writers are for whom writing is much more difficult compared to other people. 


I'm not a writer yet, though that has always been my lifetime dream. For now, I would have to satisfied with the title of a 'writer wanna be'. But I understand what it means to have this constant restlessness, to have this too many thoughts and emotions within you, to feel the urge to release them but somehow, the idea of materializing them in the form of rows of letters and words, scares you. I know how it feels to be trying to ignore the voices within you, calling and nagging, asking to be indulged. You long for the voices, you need to embrace them, yet you remain there at the other side of the river, refusing to follow the stream, afraid of being carried away, no matter how tempting the water is. 


I know how it feels to have this understanding deep down that you need to do something. Yet you're just too afraid. To worry. Too uncertain.


I have been constantly in such state of emotion for the past ten years.


I blame everything in my life now. I cannot indulge the calling, because right now I'm living the kind of life that would not allow me to do things other than the things that 'has to be done'. I cannot indulge the calling because once I do, I'd be carried away and get off the track of the life I'm living now. And going back is never easy. It is never easy to let go of the things you'd put your whole life and heart into. It's easier to pretend as if they don't exist. 


That has always been my excuses for not writing.


The life I'm living now is not the right environment for me to write. It fails to inspire me. I takes too much of my time and energy. Everyday it gets me drained right to my bones, until I have nothing more to write. I might still have many things to write, stuffing my chest and creates unbearable suffocating feeling, but I just can't write. Somewhere deep inside my heart, there's this small part of me questioning, does it really matter? Does it really matter whether I write or not? Does it really matter since there's always something more important to do? 


I blame them for preventing me to be what I always want to be: a writer. I blame the fast-paced environment of my current job for failing to provide the right kind of environment I need to be able to come up with something to write, for always keeping me away from silence and serenity, for constantly and persistently giving me chaos I don't need. I blame the life I'm living now for keeping my feet planted deep into the earth, unable to move, stuck with the kind of people (I think) I don't need, in order to help me write.


Until I read this book,The Sound of Paper, written by Julia Cameron. It's a book about personal struggles all artists experience, about the soul works artists must undertake to find inspiration.


I haven't read the whole book, but the excerpt I found on the back cover struck me.


"We must, as the elders advise us, bloom where we are planted. If we later decide that we must be transplanted, that our roots are not in soil rich enough for our spirits, at least we have tried. We have kept hold of the essential thread of our consciousness, the "I" that gives us the eye to behold."


It suddenly came down on me that none of the things I've been complaining about all this time deserve the blame for my persistently ignoring the voices within me.


I realized now that I should learn to see things differently. 


The fast-paced environment I'm currently working in could have been my source of inspiration all this time. They could have been the constant reminder reminding me how precious silence is. 


The people I think I don't need, they might have been the people I need the most in order to keep writing. They could have been showing me the reasons why we need solitude from time to time, why we need to appreciate our aloneness, to be able to dig deeper within ourselves.


All the chaos I don't need might have been there to keep my restlessness alive, so that I will not stop struggling, and questioning. So that I can keep this little flame alive and prevent myself from dying. So that I'm arrive at the comprehension I'm having now, that to dig deep into one's soul, one needs the chaos as much as one needs silence and serenity. That whatever world you live in, you just have to learn to bloom and rise to your maximum potentials, and that you actually CAN do that, because it's a matter of the "I" that is in you. It's all about you, what's in you, and what you are going to make of it. 


I think it's a form of true appreciation of one's self. It's the appreciation given by the owner of the self, the very self that has the highest authority to appreciate before other people do. The self that matters the most.

Library: a walk down the memory lane

You know what, I just got my membership card for a public library. Yay! 


I used to be a member there when I was still in college (and that was more than ten years ago), and I used to visit the library at least once a week.


That was before I was caught up with life; there were always something more important things to do than 'just reading books'. There were always some more important places to go, more important people to meet, more important life to chase. 


I still read books. I never really stopped reading. I couldn't do it. But I never visited the library again. I rarely went to the bookstore. I ordered books online and wait for them to be delivered to my office. I'd stopped having fun the way I used to do with books. To be around them. To walk among the high shelves in the library with tilted head, trying to read all the titles, because, honesty, most of the time I just went there with no specific books or topics in mind. I'd just stroll between the shelves until I find something that caught my interest. 


I usually went there with my sister and we could spend hours, browsing for books from one shelf to another, thinking of which one to prioritize because surely we wouldn't be able to read all the books that interested us within two weeks. And that, was such an important matter to decide.


Sometimes we went the bookstore, both of us were still in college at the time, walking slowly between the stacks of books, stopped every now and then at the title that we found interesting, and, most of the time, wishing that we could buy all the books that we want instead of choosing only one or two books to suit our college student's budget. We would go home dreamy-like afterwards, thinking about all the books that we couldn't buy, feeling sad yet excited to read the new books that we bought. We'd usually stopped by at a coffee shop to immediately open the new books and see what they got to tell us, and continued talking about those lovely books that we had to left at the bookstore. And we would spend our way home in silence, both with nose stuck deep into the book.


It wasn't until last month that I finally decided to register for a library membership again. I still order books online. But to be part of a library, a place where you can walk slowly between hundreds of books, where everyone speaks in hushed voice and thus makes your senses fully concentrate on the letters printed on the side cover, is different.


Now, once a week, I relish the moment when I walk into the alley between the high shelves, looking at those row of books, still with tilted head, but I use the catalog more often now, as I usually only have thirty minutes before the library closed. I'd walked out of the library with the book in my hand, and spend my two-hours trip home with my nose stuck on the book pages. 


It's a pleasant feeling and I'm glad to be feeling the feeling again, though I'm alone now without my sister. And by having said that, I guess I'm going to dedicate this blog post for her. I hope this blog post brings smile on her face the way it does to me :)