緣分

Today I wasted around two hours of my life watching Bachelor Pad. There was something initially intriguing about the show - stick a bunch of 20-something attractive people in a house for several weeks, and couples inevitably form. It kind of makes me think of the idea of destiny - or, 緣分, in Chinese. A lot of the times, the people that we fall in love with and think of as our soul mates are people that were simply conveniently there in the right place and the right time. Relationships tend to form out of a somewhat haphazard form of luck, which can be confused with destiny.

I sometimes wonder what I would be like if I were born in a different time, in a different place. Would I still be the same person, with the same personality, if I was born in 1920s Taiwan? Theres a part of me that thinks that our personalities are only semi-set in stone, that the rest is up to our geographical and cultural environments. Likewise, our 緣分 is not really destiny at all, its the product of right timing and right environment.

This is not to say that I think the men and women on the Bachelor Pad were meant to be together in some sort of cosmic way. I guess what I am sloppily trying to articulate is the idea that most of life is just made up of sheer luck, its usually only after the fact that we are able to reflect and go "aha, that is the way things were meant to be." So, I think it's time for me to go ahead and make my own 緣分. My life needs a bit of revamping.

Plotting my return

I've officially put it in writing. California, I would like to come home. I'm going to set a one year deadline on this. By the end of 2011, I would like to be apartment hunting in California (preferably the Bay) and have a job lined up. It will be time for a move.

In nearly every major world religion...

....or so I suspect, there's a great deal of focus on conquering anxiety. Those nervous moments, where we find ourselves waking up in the middle of the night or overcome as we walk down the street with an overwhelming feeling of dread -- all it means is that we're not trusting enough. Trusting in what, you might ask? I'll leave that up to you, as it's a rather personal question. If you were to ask me specifically, I would say trust in God. But then we'd be narrowing it down to just me and excluding that really sage turtle from Kung Fu Panda.



Do you see what I mean? No?

Ok then let me boil it down the specific example of me again: the particular set of religious-spiritual-cultural beliefs that I attempt to follow teaches that anxiety represents a breach in our relationship with God. If we believe in all-powerful and benevolent God who has set forth a rich life for us, then we should be able to realize that lemons can make lemonade and all that. There's a purpose to the seemingly bad times and "all will be quite okay." I would suspect that there's a great deal of calm that comes from being able to really believe that.

The difficulty is that as much as that belief has found a way into my life, so has the whole "master of my own destiny" thing. You know, because micromanaging fate is always super fun. Taken to extremes, these two bumper sticker catch phrases seem to represent polar opposites, but I would argue that that is only so when we believe we have control over much more than may be the case.

You really can't control other people, for example. Not even master politician Polonius pulled this off back in the day.

You can't control dumb luck: car accidents, brain clots, etc.

You can't choose where you were born, nor the race/culture/family that you were born into.

But, of course, we try to do all these things -- and in some cases, like avoiding car accidents or known cancer causing activities, rightfully so. The tension, bringing it back to my previous statement, is understanding what's in my hands and what's in God's hands.

I like to think that that turtle's got it down: knowing when to take the long view and short view on things. Sometimes we have to take the good times when they come. Sometimes we have to hold on to the idea that it'll all be okay in the end.

Ok. I'm talking myself in circles now, but quite a bit calmer. So, that's all for this afternoon. Until next time..

2010, the future

I think I've spent an average of 3 hours on the phone everyday with my ex-boyfriend over the last 2.5 years. We actually only dated for six months, if that. It's weird how our relationship went from being the normal sappy kind to the incredibly weird, awkward ambiguous gray area for the past two years.

Part of me knows that I need to stop playing the part of the naive ex-girlfriend who can't take a hint. But, the other part of me knows that he still cares about me a lot, and I can't help but wonder what would have happened if we hadn't broken up and if we hadn't continuously hurt each other the past two years. It's strange how loving someone isn't enough for the both of us. I know I love him, otherwise I wouldn't be able to put up with his temper, and all of the pain and grief he has put me through. I know he cares about me too, and if he doesn't love me then I'm certainly the closest thing he's come to love - I know this not because I am being a dim-witted girl, but because I have hurt him more than anybody else has hurt him.

It's odd how pain and love go hand-in-hand so easily. We are able to hurt deeply the ones we love the most - and the ones we love the most are the only ones that can hurt us deeply. A few days ago, I got into a fight with my ex, and truth be told, it was my fault. I haven't talked to him since, and being that I'm used to chatting with him for hours on end every night, the emptiness is daunting. The house feels oddly silent. I've apologized, and its all I can do. What's left for me is to wait to see if he will forgive me, or if the both of us will have finally decided to move on.

Like I've said before.... loving someone just isn't enough sometimes. Sometimes we just aren't able to erase the past wounds we've caused each other, and the only thing we can do is try to move on. If we don't talk again, I'll miss him and our conversations, and I can only hope he will remember all the fun times we had. If we do talk again, I am just worried that I am creating an open wound instead of letting my scab heal.

The Season of Pumpkin is Upon Us

Growing up in California, winter was by far my favorite season. Call it narcissism, I suppose, as I am a child of the winter and enjoy the self celebrations that the season brings. But, I like the shorter days, college basketball season, and cooler temperatures.

Now on the East Coast, fall is my favorite -- it has the same coolness as the California winter, as well as the pretty oranges and yellows and an intimate feeling of a last "hurrah" before civilization goes into hibernation for the winter.

You see, I've come to observe that spring and summer are best for making new friends. People are out and about, throwing barbecues, falling in love. Fall is about Sandy and Danny reminiscing about their "summer loving," and finding out who the winners and the keepers are. What remains after spring and summer's new blossoms fall away?

I think that winter will always be my absolute favorite season, but I like the flavors of fall. Things just seem to ripen.

Indeed, 2010 may finally be starting to taste good.