Growing Up and Living A Little

I thought I was gonna celebrate turning 28 by a mini-repeat of 2004: bushwalking. In fact, it was looking like a precise replica of 2004, with bad weather whipping the country and forecast looking bad. On Friday night, I was halfway between letting go and kinda wishing for a repeat of 2004. It turned out different, into something I don't quite know how to put into words that make sense. But anyway, here goes.

When I saw on Friday night that the forecast for Saturday turned for the worse, my mind came back to 2004. I didn't initially thought of 2004 necessarily, when I planned on how to celebrate my bday. It was nothing more than a passing thought in my head. At about 7pm Friday night I was ready to call it quits. I stood in the shower for quite a while, mulling over it. At that point, I was a few days into mulling over my openness to receive, in anything. Under the shower I thought, why would God change the weather for my bday? It's just a small thing, nothing big, nothing important. Why would God lift a finger for that? But then all my few days' [or maybe weeks'] worth of discussions with Red came up, the whole issue about me needing to receive more, open myself up to love more. On Thursday night I dreamed of nearly getting stuck in a narrow lift. I'm claustrophobic, so those five seconds constituted a nightmare. So under the shower I thought, what, don't I believe God would save me from things like that? Then I remembered that incident on Easter Sunday, when I heard God strongly told me, "Let me die for you!" He might've even said, "Let me do SOMEthing for you!" So under the shower on Friday night I took an unusual step. I let myself be vulnerable and asked God to make Saturday morning clear. I have to admit though, I was half-hearted. Half of me felt really really bad for asking for such a selfish thing.

Well, it didn't stop raining on Saturday morning. So I cancelled the bushwalk and decided to just go yumcha, such was the plan B anyway. But the Plan B stopped there, I had nothing else after. At that point I began to get a bit nostalgic. You see, when memories of 2004 came back to me on Friday night, I loaded up the 2004 documentary that I made. It reminded me of the good times we had, the great friends I had, the faces I haven't seen in a long time, and started pondering, how did I got here six years later? This sure wasn't the place I thought I'd found myself in six years later. I noted at the end of the clip that the whole bushwalk thing back in 2004 was conceived at 1am in a BK. There's no way that would happen again right now. I kinda miss those moments now, that state of self, those friends, that atmosphere, that fire.

But let's continue with the story. We decided to go bowling, only to find a whole suburb of pre-teens occupying the bowling alley with a few parents. I knew it was the end of it for us when I saw a mom with a huge box full of snacks. Even as we went out I still saw cars after cars full of kids being cattled into the place. It's not a nice place to be. So we left, decided to grab a few movies from my hard drive, and went off to Andrew's. Now, we haven't done this in a long long time, so I didn't know how it would go. Quite frankly, I didn't care, I couldn't think of any better way to spend the rest of the day anyway.

When I revisited my old clip of 2004, it brought me back to Linkin Park. This wasn't the political and anti-war Linkin Park, this was something from 2004. I thoroughly enjoyed the tunes, but couldn't help noticing that the music was all so very teen-angst-driven. It made me chuckle, and my chuckling made me think. Why did I chuckle anyway? Here's where God's sense of humor came in.

This whole thing of me not being open enough, of me being too hard, when I chuckled at old-school Linkin Park I came to a realization to the link, and it's full of holes and maybes. I used to wear my heart on my sleeve more. These days I keep it to myself. Completely. I used to want to say things to the world, to make stuff, to live out loud. These days I just wanna survive another day's work. I consider anything beyond that as unneccessary. I have become apathetic, bitter, and passive. I'm still convinced that teen-angst is selfish, but maybe I've went to the other side too far. In my attempt to live and live more efficiently, I've stopped living.

Having fun should be the easiest thing to do. But in fact, it's probably the hardest thing in my life these days. I asked myself that, and quickly I thought of playing drums. But that's where it stopped. I couldn't figure out what I do for fun apart from that these days. I've stopped enjoying anything else, pretty much. And this isn't new. Back around Easter, Ko Den told me to relax. At the time I thought, yes I know I need to learn to relax, I'm insomniac afterall. I had no idea that it goes beyond relaxation, that I'm having trouble having fun at all. And having fun is important.

When God speaks to you through Vince Vaughn and Jean Reno, you know for sure God is having fun with you.

I need to relax more, not in terms of time-use, but in my psyche. I need to live much less for work. I have to work for a living, not live day in day out to survive another day at work. On the few days when I'm supposed to celebrate that I have lived another year, I was reminded that I should start living again, that maybe parts of me have been dead for a while. Scripture says guard your heart because out of it comes the spring of life. What if I've guarded it too well? Sure it's not attacked, but it's not used either. I hardly ever drink from it these days. I thought our role here is to distribute living water to the world. Maybe I have forgotten that I have the right to drink it too, and drink it as much as I want. I have forgotten to be selfish. I'm convinced God has blessed me enough, much more than I deserve. But what if God also cares about my happiness? What if I take this life more seriously than God? How the heck can you take life more seriously than God, you ask? That's exactly the point, you can't. So if God wants me to relax more, does that mean I've been over-serious?

Maybe life doesn't have to go as hard as it can be. Maybe I don't have to be as efficient as I'd like to be. Maybe this whole story doesn't make any sense to anyone, doesn't even come close to saying everything my heart has to say, and it's okay. Maybe in my excitement to celebrate another year of life I have died a bit more. Maybe God celebrated my life with me by telling me to live a bit more. The heart is a very vulnerable organ, and maybe that's okay. A steel heart wouldn't beat, its structure is too rigid to do that. Maybe being honest, in the face of weakness and soul's selfishness, is necessary sometimes. And even if it's not necessary, maybe that's okay too. Maybe it's okay to say what you really want, no matter how embarassing it is. Maybe it's not want, it's the heart's true longing. Maybe on the surface they look and sound and taste the same, they just end up in different places and satiating different thirsts. Maybe I'm more than self-sufficient enough, and now I need to un-learn some of that a little. Maybe just accepting the situation and stop letting your heart wish for a better world for yourself is not the adult thing to do, just the passive way to live. Maybe it's high time to be more honest, more open, and embrace my neglected self: the heart part. Maybe the heart part is the hard part. Maybe I need to ask for more stuffs more often. Maybe I need to learn that God cares about me more than I care about me, and maybe I don't believe that. Or maybe I do believe that, but just too guilt-ridden to be convinced of it in my daily life. Maybe God doesn't like it when I'm like that. Maybe I need to let my heart live a little.

Maybe the Father wants to give good things to the son, but this son refuses to ask and accept. Maybe this son refuses to feel that he is loved. Maybe this son needs to be more honest with the world, with the Father, with his heart, and with himself.

I wanna feel
I wanna feel like I'm somewhere I belong