Expectations

picture by Pink Sherbet Photography

Have you ever felt empty?

Most of the time I bet you wouldn't. In fact, life is moving - and it's moving pretty fast, pretty furious. Life, is good.

But there are those times where everything just stood still. There's this sci-fic movie called "The Day The Earth Stood Still" some years back right? Ah. Random thought there.

Anyway.

Just had one of these kind of days today. I woke up drowsily from a bad bout of common cold, and it was a lazy day as classes were mostly cancelled. Broke my fast from Facebook and looked at all the notifications (about 40 of them) and just browsed. Nice pictures...funny statuses. But they all seemed lifeless where there once was a sense of connecting. It's like it finally dawned upon me that Facebook connections are so surreal. Where's the real sense of fellowship? Is anyone listening, and am I really reaching out? Barely. Perhaps the fast has actually knocked some sense into me.

I've been having some dilemmas recently that made me reflect for the past 3 days. 

Firstly, there's this heightened feeling of detachment from reality that haunts me. In reality, I know that many people love me and care for me, but when I'm in my room all alone and everyone's out and about, and even when I'm in a hall full of people and all around me are the sounds of chattering and merry making - I feel an aching sense of loneliness. Maybe I miss home, maybe I should just talk to someone. Recently posted on Facebook that I missed the feeling of hugging someone, and got all sorts of responses from friends. But all this cannot heal the hurt that surfaces itself every now and then. It could be the fact that there's this very recent revelation about the way I'm wired - which until today I'm still trying to accept and define myself by (There are people that I've told about this. Thank God for loving sisters and brothers that are there - surely God's way of comforting me in a supposed storm) 

Then, there's someone that I've been really liking for a while now (again, some people close to me know more about this but I won't talk too much about it here), but somehow I just know this is yet another case of infatuation - mainly because it's not the first time I've fallen for someone with that similar set of characteristics, and through an aching yet confirming sense of intuition as well as my observations from real life, I know it is yet another 'tak jadi' case - at least for now maybe - but who am I trying to kid. Even this kind of so called 'youthful wonder' feelings can slowly hurt me inside as hopes and dreams are dashed with reality. Oh, how nice is the feeling of being reassured, loved, and paid attention to...even if it only exists in my heightened imagination! I tell myself that I must forget, I must move on...but honestly it's really hard to get over it. What is a small thing for most people is a big deal for me, because all this while I struggle to be wanted by other people. Badly. And that is dangerous.

My assignments are catching up with me. Reading the textbooks are still okay but I wonder how on earth am I supposed to remember all that...and translate it into Malay, which while I respect and acknowledge as important to learn as a language, still baffles me until today. (Maybe I should write my next blog post in BM or Mandarin to train myself. Haha...)

Okay, since I'm losing the mood to write for now, I'm going to let this sit for a bit. Thank God for times of reflection. Right now I'm going to do what I'm supposed to be doing - continuing in activities that were planned for today. Meanwhile, for the weekend I'm going to take a real break (no distractions from above 3 categories) by listening, receiving and pouring out my heart to God at camp. And to brainstorm for stuff to write for the CF newsletter. And the two presentations next week. Taking a break now. Ciao :)