Thick skin

Her face was transparent
Her hands clean of sins
Her mind still untouched
And her heart always on her sleeve

Her skin was paper-thin
Her voice barely heard
Her posture made of porcelain
And her eyes always revealing the truth

Time passes by
Her face layered by countless masks
Her hands covered in dirt
Her mind messed up
And her heart hiding from the world

But her skin got unbreakable thick
Her voice bellowed from the crowd without raising it
Her posture outreached the air of injustice
And her eyes cautious of betrayals

Her innocence stripped away
Layer by layer
It seems such a pity
She asked herself:
“If you could do it again, would you?”
“In a heartbeat” was her answer

From the girl who rambles through life

Stop Comparing Your Life With Others

Ever since I got the taste of solo traveling, I wanted to do it again and again. The very first time I went abroad for a certain period of time was also something I wanted to do just for myself.
Throughout the years, I always have been influenced by opinions of those I thought knew it better than me. To some extent, they indeed had more life experience and I believe only wanted the best for me. But in the end, they are not me and won’t exactly know what I actually want. It all comes down to me making the decisions and walking my own crafted path.

Coming from an Asian household, there is a certain path all Asian parents would love their offspring to take which is; study hard, get a prestige degree and settle with a high paid job.

Nothing wrong with that. 

The only thing is; I don’t need to follow this path to make my parents happy or proud. For a long time, I thought otherwise. To not follow that path meant that I already have failed them which is the last thing I want to do to them.
Everything sort of went smoothly until I was working full-time. I ticked off boxes as I went further into the path until I couldn’t see where I could put my feet on. I tried to justify it away by comparing it with my peers and would comfort myself that this was the right decision to make.

Every time I started to worry, I would compare my life with others. 

In your twenties, you should study hard and get your degree.
In your late twenties, you should start having kids and get married.
On and on and on.

That’s what happened when I kept comparing myself with others that I actually forgot that I still have control over my own life. I’m not supposed to have a certain life just because it is normalized in society.

That goes the same with you.

Don’t let yourself pressured into a certain type of lifestyle just because a majority of people approve it. 

So what you don’t have a steady job?
So what you don’t have a stable relationship?
So what you don’t want kids?
So what people judge you because you haven’t done this or that? 

Who the f cares? If you care about how others will view you, think again. How sad to adapt your whole life to feel accepted by others. The only approval you need is from yourself. Period.

Steer it in whatever direction you want.

Take responsibility for yourself and just dive in when you are ready to go after your own life.

From the girl who rambles through life 

Connected by the heartstrings of each other

A thousand miles away
Still feel the warmth
Covering me like a safety blanket
When I see your reflection through the screen

I told you: “Goodnight, close your eyes”
You told me: “Goodmorning, open your eyes”
Barely could keep it open

Still, took a last glimpse before the missing continued

Continents away
Hours of difference
Got lost countless times
But I remember every step back to you
My footprints deeply imprinted on our journey
While our bodies are connected by the heartstrings of one another.

I’m sitting here, lacking vitamin D
You are sitting there, hiding from the burning sun
Both, on the other side of Earth
Still, I know when you are upset
By the strong pull of your heartstring.

Did you feel my comfort when I entwined mine with you?

A thousand miles away.
That’s basically it.
Because in the end,
We are connected by the heartstrings of each other

From the girl who rambles through life

Impact starts with the first step

One domino block is just an object by itself.

A grain of rice is not a full meal just like that one melody is just a sound by itself.

One brick is not a house, let alone a home.

All of this by itself are just random loose components but you still need it to create or build something.

This applies to people too; in all different kind of forms though, but it all comes down to impact. It also depends on what position that particular person holds that determines the force of impact.
We need impact to survive, grow, learn, get inspired, stay motivated and get things done. In most cases, to make an impact, it needs to have enough people to get involved. How strong and well-formulated an opinion may be, it can’t stand on its own feet without a solid base. Still, where do we even start when no one is making the first move?

Impact also requires repetition.

Repeating the same steps, repeating the same movements, repeating the same words. It takes a lot of patience to get to the point that it starts to have a slight impact on others.

When you get overwhelmed by music, know it all started with a press of a piano key, a string of a guitar, a blow of a trumpet.
When you gaze in awe of old buildings around you, know it all started with a person putting on the first brick.
When you are speechless of what you have just tasted at that new restaurant, know it all started with an idea, turned into action with the careful pick of an ingredient.

Surely it can go the other way too.
Our environment can get polluted every time when a person purchases a plastic bag, sea creatures can get hurt along the way by the excessive amount of litter. These are all decisions made by us humans, can’t blame anything else.

If it’s possible to make negative impacts, then sure it is possible to turn the tables.

If you think you don’t have what it takes to make an impact or difference? Think again. If everyone thinks like that, then guess what? Nothing would ever happen. Surprising?

Nah, don’t think so. 

It takes one step to start the oil running. So you tell me you want to help the environment by becoming a vegetarian, but don’t even try first because you think a single person can’t change much? Well again, if every single person thinks like that, then indeed, nothing will change, not even one bit.

A snowflake may not cause a snowstorm but it can only occur with the very first drop of a snowflake. 

One word may not make a book but it is the first step to make it into a story. 

One helping hand may not help all those in need but it doesn’t mean you didn’t help at all. Every little bit helps. 

An impact may require a minimal amount of people that believe, support, appreciate a particular gesture, action, subject etc. But don’t forget:

Every input counts. 

So the next time you think it’s useless to contribute or start something, how about making the first step – so passionately – that you even may inspire others along the way to do the same on their own terms, who knows?

From the girl who rambles through life 

Lost but don’t want to be found

Wandering for hours

Turned into days

Where I lost the count of sunsets

Putting one foot before the other

The only certainty

Wandering for months

Turned into half a year

Where I lost the count of steps I have taken

But remember the marks I have forever left on others

I’m lost but don’t want to be found

Because I have escaped

The maze of routine

From the girl who rambles through life 

Oh Mother Nature, show us our true colors

Raindrops ticking rapidly on the windows. Pebbles forming on the streets while the sunlight is hiding behind an enormous cloud. Footsteps increasing with every drop. The sound of rain hitting the soil with the thunder above the impatience.

”Why is it raining?” a child asks her mother.
”Because it is testing our patience.”
The child never understood what she meant until the day she did.

She looked up and a drop of water touched her face. Countless people hurried their paces and opened their umbrellas together with their complaints. Worrying lines appeared on blank canvases and she can feel the impatience in the air.

The next day, the sun has chased away the grimness and is dominating the sky. Vivid blue with specks of white dots. How funny that the same people who walked down the streets on their way to work can appear so different in a brighter light. Mouth angles on perfect angles as if it’s created by a swing that goes back and forth.

A person doesn’t show their true colors when all circumstances are aligned towards them. A person shows their true colors, whether they like it or not when all circumstances are indeed not aligned towards them.

Little Miss Sunshine can suddenly turn into Miss Thunderstorm when things don’t go her way.

~ Oh Mother Nature, show us our true colors.
~ Oh Mother Nature, reveal the true light of all of us.

Trees keep being cut down.
Forests lit up into a gigantic fireplace.
Oceans poisoned by ignorant habits.
Less and less green reflected on our eyes.
We deceived ourselves by thinking that we have the upper hand but
we don’t even realize that we are the puppets for the consequences of our own actions.

The sky turned grey again and all of a sudden, she felt the same strain of impatience slowly closing in her. She felt suffocated, not because of the air – but those who inhaled impatience and exhaled negative energy.

Like second handed smoking. And guess what? She has never liked smoking.

From the girl who rambles through life. 

Communicating and listening must always go hand in hand

Noises everywhere, never stopping.

Is it me, or is everyone just talking for the sake of talking?
A friend told me that there are two kinds of talking which are chatting or conversating. Chatting is lighthearted most of the time and doesn’t really require us to think what we say. The purpose is mostly to fill in the gaps of silence. The good thing about it is that we can do it with everyone we encounter, especially with those we just met. It can be a great tool to break the ice and slowly go further from the surface to get to know each other better. but most of the time it just stays on the surface.

To communicate is something else. It requires much more than just opening our mouths and say the first thing that comes up to our minds. Communication is not only about the output of words. It’s about actively channeling through your mind to get conscious about your thoughts and how to use that to shed light on subjects that need to talk about in order to change it. As much as it’s about speaking, it’s also about listening carefully. It’s not about filling in the silence, but use that silence as a necessary pause to process, listen and shape the right words in our mind before saying it out loud.

Many may are able to hold a conversation by sharing their thoughts but not listening to each other one bit.

Do you even communicate?
Do you remember to stop talking and catch your breath? 

To recognize what you are usually talking about also reflects on how self-absorbed you are. If you only talk about yourself without further indication to share information to someone for whatever reason, for example getting to know each other better or to help the other understand where you’ re coming from with your thoughts – then yeah, you are kinda self-absorbed. That goes the same with listening. If you constantly interrupt, feels impatient when someone else is talking or shift the direction of the conversation towards yourself once again, then yeah you are for sure too much into yourself. Get that checkup ASAP.

No, seriously.

Chatting is fun and stuff, but I don’t know about you – I want to leave this world a better place after I have turned in a speck of dust. No matter how small the change may be, it’s still a change nonetheless. How to do that?
If you care about something, spread that around for more awareness. Nothing is more efficient than through communication. Communication including all the emotion and silences.

Too much white noise, what we need is context and patience. 

Ask yourself;
Do you even communicate?
Do you even listen?

Talking without listening is just a way to stroke your own ego – it only fills your own desires in the end. Only when talking and listening is aligned with each other will a conversation brings opportunities to change something.

It always must go hand in hand, never should lose sight of each other 

From the girl who rambles through life 

I’m looking for a healing potion

I’m looking for a healing potion
for things that can’t be fixed.
A tearing bond that is dangling between life and death.
A misstep so out of character that it can’t be traced back to its owner.
Fragility radiates throughout head and toe which can break down by a mere touch.

In search of a healing potion
to ease the pain or sometimes the numbness.
Broken memories shattered piece by piece.
Promises turned into lies.
I’m just here looking for a healing potion in any form possible.

I’m looking for a healing potion for
things, we all want to fix.
Like the strangers that turned into comrades.
But promises turned into disappointments.
They sailed away when the very first storm was in sight.

Tried many potions.
Some were sweet,
some were bitter,
but none of them my taste.

I’m just here looking for a healing potion
to finally make me feel at peace.

From the girl who rambles through life 

Nothing worth pursuing is easy

Nothing worth pursuing is easy

I am in constant pursuit.

Of what?

Self-development

Ever since I felt stuck in life after graduation, I was desperately finding a way to not feel that ever again. I thought the answer to it was to find something I would see myself doing as a career. After some attempts, I found myself once again stuck and confused, not knowing what my following step would be.

So I caved. Isolated from the outside world. Isolated from any human contact except my family and boyfriend. The longer I retreated and stayed in my cave a.k.a my comfort zone, the harder it was to get out of it. On the other hand, the longer I stayed inside, the more my brain begged me to keep it nourished with more exposure.

But comfort is easy, always has been.
It’s our guilty pleasure, except it gets dangerous when we allow it to take a huge space of our life. Guess what? We usually welcome comfort without hesitation into our arms because we know there is no any effort attached to it. What I also mean by comfort is the fact that we use it as a justification for anything we would like to try out but are too afraid to act on it.

Just like me when I wanted to grow in life but didn’t want to go through the actual process. I may have imagined how better off I would be if I already have taken the necessary steps, but I was too busy waiting for the perfect moment to start. The moment when all stars are aligned towards me. And of course, that didn’t happen. To pursue something won’t happen in a week, a month or even a year, let alone overnight.

There is no perfect moment to start.

I waited long enough to finally enter the door to pursue growth. That door led me to all different directions where I get to choose which one I want to take. But that was too overwhelming, to begin with. Because for me, even the first step was already hard enough, let alone all the following ones which made me further away from my comfort zone. Each step came with different challenges which were equally as hard as the previous steps. Because during each step, I grew stronger while the challenges got harder.

Nothing worth pursuing is easy.

It already starts with getting out of bed. Each morning, I rather sleep in or even want to ignore the alarm clock altogether. It’s easy to give in and continue to sleep under the warm blankets. It’s easy to stay in hibernation instead of going into the wild that can take you closer to your pursuit. It’s somewhere out there – where life happens.

I don’t know exactly where, but for sure it’s not in our bubble – our comfort zone.

I keep thinking I haven’t accomplished much but when I actually look back on how much I have grown by the small steps I have taken  – compared to those days that my brain was on auto-pilot – I already have been working on my self-development. And not only career-wise but on all aspects of life.

Nothing worth pursuing is easy.

The first step is the hardest. Then it gets better, but still hard.

I mean, look at me:
From a full-time hermit to a social animal who go out almost every day. If that isn’t development, I don’t know what is.

From the girl who rambles through life  

Mix your own shade of color that suits you

Energy. It flows through all of us.

Everywhere we go, we take in energy. Everyone we encounter, we exchange energy, no matter how brief; we overlap each other with the energy we put out into the world.
Just like colors from a spectrum, there is an infinite of energy running endlessly through the universe. We tend to lean towards energy that is categorized in the positive area, or to sketch it in a color; green, because the perfect tint of green is calm, restorative and abundant. But there is no such thing as perfection as we know it. We all know there are three primary colors: red, blue and yellow. Without these colors, there is no possible way to create the color green to begin with. In other words; positive energy isn’t something that stands by itself. It is mostly mixed with other substances to keep it balanced.

Each passing hour of a day, different shades of light and colour reflect on our eyes. Not a moment is the same. Just like our energy and the energy surrounding us.

Exposing ourselves to different shades of colors of a spectrum let us experience a wide range of emotions.

Let’s say, when you expose yourself to  energy of passion, the perfect tint of red, your own aura will get affected too; when you go overboard with passion, you may get too impulsive and out of touch with the outside world. When you don’t allow yourself to overlap with even a hint of passion, you lack of fuel and motivation to get going.
Another example, when you expose yourself to compassionate energy, the perfect tint of blue, it can turns our own core in a different shade as well. When we go overboard, we may neglect ourselves and forget that we also need to think about ourselves. If we are too self-centered, we may lose people around us for we only think about ourselves.
And then you have the last primary colour, the perfect tint of yellow, which mostly indicates joy. When it dominates through your core, it can shows sides of cowardice for you only allow yourself to feel joy. When it has a limited space in your colour palette, you overcomplicates everything to the point that you can’t seem to find the joy in daily life.

We are all made of different shades of colors, ever changing like the seasons.

However, every core of a person won’t change that easily.
I would take myself as an example. The energy I have surrounding myself is mostly yellow, which means my deepest need is to be able to express my individuality by using my mind to inspire and create new ideas. My greatest asset is that I am creative, often being the one who comes up with new ideas but at the same time can’t bring it out into reality for my head is always somewhere in the clouds, daydreaming into a different reality. I am too impulsive and make quick decisions out of anxiety.

Mix your own shade of colour that suits you.

I would never be a blue or red colour for this matter, but I can mix shades of this colors to bring the best out of myself. To expose myself with different kind of energy and make it into my own personal experiment. To make it work for yourself without losing yourself. To be content with the shade of your reflection but never too proud to try mixing another color with it. To surround yourself with different kind of people to get familiar with all colors of a spectrum. And by doing so, overlapping your own energy with others to create a color that no one else has;

Your own unique blended shade.

From the girl who rambles through life