Happy Halloween!

Q is for ......Question Yourself.

It's hard to pretend that everything else in the world doesn't matter, especially when it does. Some of us aren't born to be machines and as much as we try, hiding and holding everything inside of us only serves to eat away the parts of us which makes us who we are. But the farce isn't without purpose.

Sometimes, we have to do things we don't like in order to uphold the responsibilities we are tasked over. More so, we do it to protect the people we care about. While taxing on the state of our sanity, nothing good comes from directing our frustrations and displeasure at the world. So to protect that world, we become its source of strength. We become the cold dark that's unaffected by the rigors and stress that life mercilessly throws at us. To protect everything we care for, we shoulder those burdens that are mapped out to test us.

Yet, what of our own fragile self? Do we have a choice to save ourselves from a potential breakdown? Yes, we always do. The question is, will life ever let us off so easily to take a break? That depends on how lucky you can be. At least in my case, I don't have to be surprised at what I already know. Life for me isn't one born with a silver spoon in my mouth, but at least I can say I kept on fighting it, even if was for selfish reasons, even if it was for selfless motives. At least I keep fighting…until I go down that is.

When that time comes of course, don't blame me and most certainly don't blame yourself. It was my choice given what I had. For better or worse, I think I reserve the right to exercise my actions to the best of my abilities. Especially because it was done to protect you, from the world that would hurt you.

And especially from the me who burns with a black fire that no one should ever see.

Are You Happy With Your Life?

I don't know.

In my defense, happiness is something I've never really sought in my life. I've learnt from a very young age that with happiness, comes everything else that's not exactly happy. Misery and pessimism are worlds that I'm much more accustomed to living. Not to say that it's always a bad thing to be living in a cynical world where you have to endure the roller coaster of emotions all the time. It's just that when you look at things this way, to appreciate the simple moments of happiness, you have to appreciate the abyss as well.

Yet, if I look back at my life right now. Everything I've seen. Everything I've gone through. Everything I've endured. Everything I've achieved. Everything I have. I have a lot of things in the world that many people don't. Then again, I also don't have a lot of things in the world that many people take for granted. If there are a million and one things in the world I should be happy for, there are also a million and one things I shouldn't be smiling at.

So no. I don't really know whether I'm happy with my life because I stand right in the middle of the fence. It's hard to be happy when you know what it cost to get the things you want. It's harder still to be sad when you know you've gotten them already.

What I am is content and at peace with my life. Now that's something I would walk the fine line for for as long as I draw breath.

Need or Want?

For as long as I have realised, everything we do in this world is divided into two major groups. One is what we want to do, the other is what needs to be done. Often enough we seem to always do one or the other, it's rare that we do both what we want done and what needs to be done. It's even more rare that what we want done is really want needs to be done.

Ok…maybe the last part is not as rare as expected. Still…how many people do you know do things they need in their lives and really really want to do it? How many of us love paying our taxes and bills or taking out the garbage. How many of us these days never complain about the things we study in school or the work we add up in our careers? It's all things that we need to get done…but do we usually want to? Of course not.

But why stop there, what about the bigger things in life? What about choosing between your duty towards say…your career and the love of your family? What about taking it a step higher to the ultimate question. Would you sacrifice love for the sake is a better world? Or would you sacrifice the better world for the sake of love? If you knew you could change the world but in doing so gave up any chance of finding true love would you…COULD you do it? Or would it be the other way round?

Need and want. Either way…both are equally important to you as a survival asset and as your responsibility to the society. So what about balancing need and want? Well…being in a particular position now, I can say I've got one of that covered. My only question is…how long I can keep it balanced before it all goes to hell? Would I ever find something I want in my personal quest to do the things I see needed to be done? Maybe…but that's all part of life, either I find things on my road or not.

Personally in the end, I find it less troublesome if we were to concentrate on what needs to be done rather than what we want done. That way we don't have to constantly look over our shoulders wondering if the concequences are going to bite us back in the ass. It's just that…how much personal happiness would you have to sacrifice for those needs? Is the price worth it?

I guess that's something we'll have to find that on our own roads again…

P is for ... Procrastination.

1.Time is always relative. It passes by fast when you're doing something important. It passes by even faster when you're doing something you think is important but really isn't at all.

2.Sometimes a moment of reminiscence can turn into a weekend long marathon of reclaiming the old glory days. Complete of course with staying up 'till the wee hours of the morning for reasons that had nothing to do with fast approaching deadlines

3.Scheduled power cuts does put things into perspective. We take electricity for granted far too much. So much so that despite sleeping in to past the time, I still find myself pacing back and forth over the same spot, lost in aimless contemplation of what could I possibly do next that doesn't need to be plugged into the wall socket.

4.Saying you'll turn in early for the night doesn't always take into account listening to stories from people far away. Especially people you miss dearly. Especially stories you wish you could have been a part of.

5.Sometimes the weekend doesn't always last for two days, especially if you have control over your own working schedule. Sometimes there is just nothing to do. Or at least that's what you keep telling yourself while looking away from the pile of papers you're supposed to be reading.

6.Procrastination can be such a pain to deal with. But sometimes, just sometimes, it can be your only friend in the entire world. Especially if you pretend that there are no consequences to it.

Reasons That I Forget to Remember.

Some days, I forget the reasons why I don't want to be around people. I forget that the world isn't always forgiving of an honest opinion. That people can't be objective without being emotionally opinionated first. That it is easier to be a hypocrite and maintain a social standing than it is to be alone and maintain a principle.

Some days I forget that there was a reason why people left me alone. I forget that we don't always speak the same language. That whatever I have to say isn't something people usually enjoy talking about. That what people usually do isn't something I can join in without wishing how did it ever come to this and how can I get out of it.

Some days I forget that there was a reason why I am me. I forget that is a part of me that wishes there could be more people that enjoy the same world I live in. That in my own perfect space, torturing stupidity would be an acceptable and legal form of entertainment. That somehow I don't have to resort to writing down so many lines in a digital world to share with someone my own thoughts and feelings which I don't do in the real world.

Some days I remember what it's like to be the me I know. I remember that I usually stop musing about it at this point because life's too short to wonder what you are and who you were supposed to be. That what matters is how happy or content we are with the person we've become or the company we choose to be with. That some things are worth sticking up to regardless of what happens.

So you remember and that's what you tell yourself.

O is for ... Oh My God, What The Hell Am I Doing With My Life!

1.When life becomes routine and everything is set on autopilot, sometimes you have to remind yourself that there is a bigger purpose to life than just what you're doing now. Lest you end up being stuck in the same plot over and over again. Never going anywhere or amounting to anything.

2.If there is anything I don't like, is when there are spontaneous interruptions in my tight schedule. I don't see how some people can find that "a welcoming distraction"

3.When the end of a line approaches, is it alright to dread the consequences of your actions prior? Is it even alright to dread the beginning of a line in which you don't know where it ends?

4.In the face of all the worry, all the fear and all the doubt, there is a little dark hole in my head I crawl into to make everything go away. A place where I am abstained from everything that a person feels. Right now, I think I need to permanently put a bed and a coffee machine into that hole.

5.Some days, not even a generous helping of your favourite bourbon on the rocks can make your day feel any better. But it does always put things into perspective. When all is done and gone, it's always time to refill the glass. Over and over again.

Growing Pains.

The thing about youth is that we often mistake pride for intelligence and wisdom. Just because we are able get through high school and live a decent life, we believe that we're untouchable, free of the burden that life gives us. So when life occasionally throws a stick into our well oiled gears, we fall, our minds miserable and hurt, unable to see past what we only know as our own world.

I was young once and given the circumstances of my age, I think I still am. Yet the burdens of my youth were never one without a singular perspective, one that drove me to the edge of depression and spiralling insanity. That was my folly of youth, the belief that my own personal hell was mine for all eternity, a black hole in which I cannot escape and one that no one can help.

It wasn't until years later until I realized that people could help and that I had a choice. My burden's may have been my own to bear, but by no means did they mean I had to bear them in misery.

Going through the misery and darkness has never meant that we are special, even if our situations are unique to ourselves. Proving that your black cat is blacker than mine doesn't change the fact that we could have tried to be better than what we have become. It doesn't change the fact that suffering is still a universal constant in life and everyone goes through it. Suffering doesn't make you any different, what you do with your suffering does.

At the end of it, we still have a choice, even if they are limited to what we would or would not do. Misery will always be bound to the pride that tells us we deserve better. Anger and frustration will always be entwined by the expectations that a good life have always coddled us by. Sometimes we have to choose between letting that pride go or living with the misery under false pretences. More often than not an easy choice that's hard to enact.

I might not have found a way to completely let go of my pride or my misery, but it doesn't mean it has to offset the things in life that are good and worth being happy for. Part of living life is to know when to make your demons an issue and when to keep it at bay. It's not worth building a reputation by being a drama queen over things that aren't worth fussing about.

Given the old cliché that I often use, we all grow old. Maybe this a moment that starts telling you to grow up.