What I've Become

I wake up in the morning and try not to see

What has become of the man who was once me

A man ever strong, ever proud, ever free,

But now, a puppet I hang, my strings make me be,

To wake up each day and think only of you,

The pain of losing you fills my being.

Till all I am, is this wooden puppet.

And yet I hang, I smile.

I put on my mask, the mask that is me

The me everyone around me sees,

The one they assume me to be.

The  mask makes me no hero, no guardian

It imprisons me, clinging to me

I pull on my cape and make some try

To be the light, to soar, to fly

And yet I fall, I bleed.

I walk along beside you, glancing at you,

You turn around but still you don’t see,

You stare right through me,

A ghost I am, pale and cold,

A ghost to you, my world,

I stare at you, hoping to be heard,

But who can hear a spirit from another world?

And yet I wait, I whisper.

Goodbye you said to me once,

And from that day, The sky’s been dark

No sun, no moon, no stars for me

A statue I’ve become, the life fades from me,

A lifeless block of stone, with a face carved into me

My heart torn out, only granite is within me,

Who could love a block of stone? You, I’d hoped.

And yet I remain, I stare

All that you were to me is now worth nothing.

I to you, am nothing, you to me, are everything,

I would give anything to be with you again,

But how can I give anything, when all I am is a void,

A void devoid of joy, of happiness, of self.

Someone who is nothing, a mere remnant of someone

The one who was there for you, the one who loved you

And yet I live, I cry.

The Closed Window

I look in, not out

Of a place where I used to be,

A place of peace and warmth,

Now I stand outside the window

Shivering in the chill of the night,

The fire inside burning bright,

The fire I once started, once sat by,

I see it from the outside, I cry

A place where once there was a need of me,

A place which was once no place without me,

Where I spent my time with ones who wanted me,

People who looked forward to days with me,

Now I fight for them to spend days with me,

I beg them to want me,

A place that is only a place without me,

A place where they have no need of me.

I stand in the rain outside,

The rain pouring down, embracing my tears,

As I remember the embrace of the ones within,

The warmth of their eyes, as they looked at me,

Now the coldness of their gaze cuts just as deep

They wish I were somewhere else,

But I have nowhere else.

To run and hide, I stand and cry.

I look back on what that was,

How they were, and how I was,

I wonder in vain where I went wrong,

The past offers no answers, only questions

Ones I wish had never been asked,

I wonder if it were I who was wrong,

Whether even then, I could just not see,

That which was clear to see.

Now I look in, wishing for them to see

The me behind this sorrowful face,

The me that once was theirs,

The voice that I hide behind my silence,

A silence that speaks more of whats within that anything else,

I know they see, I wish they hear,

But what can they do, the windows still closed,

And shall ever be, to keep out the cold.

The windows closed, but now I see,

My reflection on the glass, looking in at me.

I tear my eyes from that pale shade and look around.

I am inside where it is warm, the fire burns beside me.

My reflection shivers in the glass, the cold outside,

But I am where I always was, inside.

My eyes widen as I realize my mistake,

I close them, a breath I take.

So quick was I to self-pity,

To run and beg for sympathy.

The gazes were never cold, nor was I never needed,

The window was not around them, but me instead.

The window closed to keep out the cold,

But instead it was keeping in the cold.

I open it now, the air flows in, bringing warmth, joy,

The cold gaze was always mine, never theirs.

The window is open now, and shall always be,

The warmth of the room clear for me to see,

The place I thought I was never again to be,

Seems vibrant, joyous to me,

I look into their eyes, and I feel their love,

But there is a task left to do.

I walk over to the window, where my reflection gazes in,

I smile, and it smiles back at me.

Let Go

What does it mean to let go? Does it mean to abandon, to forget, to act like something never existed? Or does it mean to accept something so fully, To understand it so deeply, to believe in it so much, that you realize that its better off without you?

Letting go of the past is one thing. You cant abandon it and you may think you've forgotten it, but you haven't really. Why would one want to forget who one is, because ultimately, where you are, who you are, why you are, is entirely because of your past. The decisions you made, the decisions that were made for you, the people you met, the people you didn't, the risks you took, and the ones you deemed too risky. You've made your past, and through your past, you've made your present, and this present gives you the platform to build your future. There is no meaning to letting go of all of this, if you believe letting go is, just letting go. To truly let go of your past, to be rid of the weight it carries, the burden it places on your shoulders, the expectations that arise from it, so that you may have a present that is not merely an echo of the past, is to accept the past in its entirety. With no excuses, and no justifications, look back on what you've done, the mistakes you've made, but never regret them for a moment. There are no do-overs in life, and wishing there were is just a waste of time. Grasp your past and realize what is is you've done, the decisions you made out of emotion, or pride, and how they've shaped your life. Think how your life may have been different had you thought differently, but never dwell on what could have been, because that can never be. The sooner you accept your past with no reservations, and no regrets, then and only then have you let go of it.

Letting go of a person is incredibly more difficult than letting go of the past. For one, its not something of yours that you're giving away. Its someone else. Someone who means the world to you, because its only such people that you would want to let go off. I know that sounds paradoxical, but think of this. If it were someone who didn't mean much to you at all, and you said goodbye, then thats all there is to it. Sure you'd feel sad for a while perhaps, but the void of something that was there, that is no longer there wouldn't eat you up form within. You wouldn't flagellate yourself believing that finally I have let my ego get the better of me. Thats why letting go of a persons harder. When you let go of the past, you're satisfying your ego. In the process, yes you bruise it and batter it, when you take the blame for your mistakes and your decisions, but the ultimate purpose is to make yourself happy, or at least happier than you were. But to let go off a friend, you have to curb your ego. You have to stomach your pride. You accept that they are better off without you. Without you introducing doubts and uncertainties into their life, without you putting compulsions on them, and how they should be. To do that, takes a strong will, and true love towards the person you're letting go of.

Afterwards, when its all said and done, when the void within has slowly started to recover, when you get used to the phantom pain of something that was there but is no longer there, nor will ever be there again, you can only hope that the one you let go off, is truly happier, and that you have made the right choice. And then as you sit thinking back over the past, how you were, how you are now, and the future that should have been, but will now not be, you let go of that feeling as well.

But as with everything worth anything, easier said than done...

Reflection

I look into a mirror, the mirror on my wall,

I see shoulders slumped in defeat,

I see eyes desperate for a retreat

Into myself, where I am safe,

Me demons cannot pursue me here,

My other self shows real fear,

And in his eyes, my eyes I see,

A longing, a desire to be free.

I look into a mirror, the mirror of my friends,

I wonder what they see,

As they stare back at me,

A man of arrogance, a man too proud,

Someone they'd rather lose in a crowd,

Very few among them know,

How my true feelings flow,

I wonder what they see,

Their eyes bore right through me.

I look into a mirror, the mirror of the world,

People I know merely by a glance,

Others I wish, to meet, I had a chance,

All of them they look at me,

Some, like, others hate what they see,

They see a man too vain, too cruel,

A man ever eager to fight a duel,

Someone who wont back down till the win,

No matter the cost, he must win,

That is what they see as they stare,

None of them even care,

To see the real me, the one I hide,

My light, or maybe, darker side,

How can I blame them, I give them just cause,

I wish they knew though, everyone has flaws

I look into a mirror, the mirror of my heart,

The one within which noone sees,

The reflection no man can seize

The only me I ever want to be,

The one I want everyone to see,

But he is hidden deep within,

Safe from the world, he lays within,

Crying with every breath I take,

Every change I make for the world's sake,

All I want is for him to stop his tears,

For the world to overcome its fears,

And embrace the one within, my true self,

How can they, when I haven't, myself.

Something I wrote as a post, that is, right now, unlike my other works, which were written much earlier than when I posted them. A much more personal poem, and I know some people who might appreciate its honesty...

Pessimist and Proud!

Inspiration comes in various forms, but none as weird as mine today I'm sure.

Have any of you noticed that at the top of any blog on blogger, there's an option called next blog? That randomly throws you to some other blog, and this time, after chain-jumping for a while, one of my online activities, I ended up in a Chinese blog about a guy getting some random Chinese word shaved into his head. Yeah. Seriously. I was impressed. and considering I'm posting, I guess inspired too... My parents assure me they never dropped me when I was a baby.. not so sure now.... :P

As most of you know, I'm a third year engineering guy right now, and I'm pretty happy with life in general, mostly because I dont really ask too much from it. I have my aims and my desires and my hopes, but being a born pessimist, I assume that none of them will ever come true. Sure that sounds depressing, but listen to my logic, and I'm sure you'll come around to my way of thinking.

If you're an optimist and always believes the best will happen, then you're bound to be disappointed, because real life never happens perfectly. IF you wish for something you know is a long-shot, then chances are you wont get it. Sure you can quote the stories where the impossible does happen, but they are so few and far between. Thats why they're even remembered, because they're atypical. But on the other hand, if you believe that the worst will always happen, then you can only ever be pleasantly surprised at what does actually happen, because by definition, the "worst" is the worst, and life can only be better. Think about it, it makes sense. I'm standing up for pessimists all over the world as I write this. Too long have we been shunned and marginalized for speaking our views. WE play the role noone wants. The villain, the bad guy. The guy who thinks the plan will fail, the guy who believes that there isn't a "good guy" within us all, while secretly all we want is to be proven wrong. Yup. We want to be proven wrong.

The reason so few people like to be pessimistic is because it takes effort. Any idiot can go around hoping the best will happen, but a pessimist has to think about the worst that ca happen. and then think of how to deal with it. Being pessimistic is really easy, but being a true pessimist, now thats hard. It entails accepting and planning for the worst. You have to be willing to deal with the worst-case scenario if it does arise, and you have to have the self-belief that you can handle it. If not, you're headed to world of despair and depression if you follow the pessimistic path.

I think thats a common misconception, a pessimist doesn't want the world to go up in flames, but he thinks it might, so that he can be pleased when it doesn't. A cynic, on the other hand WANTS it to burn. And all the while, the optimist sits and makes flower-chains and sings weird music.

The pessimist wants the world to be good and wants things to be alright. He wants people to be good and the plan to work, but he'd rather be the brunt of negativity than be disappointed if life doesn't go exactly to plan. In that sense I think the optimist is actually a secret masochist. He wants to be disappointed again and again and again, and after a while he becomes the most useless thing possible- a cynic.

Optimists gone bad make cynics. They hoped for the best, hoped for the utterly impossible. Hoped exams would get cancelled just because they didn't study, hoped their bosses' planes would crash, and such lovely thoughts, which of course never happened, now they've lost faith in the world and spend time sprouting negativity. A true pessimist will never become a cynic Why would he? Life always turns out better than he had hoped for. No time does he feel that the world is out to get him, but rather he always feels that the world has been good to him.

I'm proud to be a pessimist. I truly believe that the worst will happen always, and I always feel overjoyed when it doesn't. Life is hard, yes, but the depth of hardness is relative. I f you set the bar of how hard you think life is going to be high enough, and prepare yourself for that, you'll be surprised at how easy life actually becomes..

EQUILIBRIUM

I guess my old exuberance has caught up with me once again. I'm posting again!

Do you sometimes feel like the more you try to change something, not yourself, but just something, the more it ends up staying the same? What I mean is, as you try to change something, inertia kicks in, and everything goes kaput. It stays changed for a while but almost always returns to how it was. One thing in chemistry, my least favourite subject ever by the way, that I appreciated, was the Le-Chatelier principle. Basically it says that if a system is in dynamic equilibrium, and you try to disturb it, the system tries all it can to restore equilibrium. In a nutshell, you play around with it, it plays back. Its happy how it is, and it'll try to get back to how it was. In a sense, thats my entire life principle. Live and let live. If I'm happy with the world, and the world thats important to me is happy with me, then why try to change? It makes no sense really, to change equilibrium. And thats what I feel that everyone should acheive in life. Equilibrium. Not money or happiness, but equilibrium. A state which is dynamic and static at the same time. Things are changing, you're living life, but you're stable at the same time. Equilibrium. My life's aim in one word- EQUILIBRIUM. Profound epiphany...

Returning to the chemistry analogy again, There are catalysts that can shift the equilibrium in the way you want, and I think that all money and 'happiness' (the ' ' is just so that you can put whatever you define as happiness there) really is are catalysts that shift this equilibrium one way or the other. When you're actually fully and completely satisfied with life, you attain equilibrium, and no matter what happens, you won't lose it. This is of course assuming day-to-day events. A death or something would obviously alter the context of it all, but once you do attain equilibrium ,I think its very VERY hard to lose it, because like it or not, the system (you) tries sub-consciously to retain it.

Now I'm sure you have lots of arguments to this admittedly over-simplification, but I'm sure you get the basic premise. If you are happy with the world, and the worlds happy with you, let it stay that way. If something changes the equilibrium gets disturbed and you try and get it back.. Simple right??

I'm back!

3 months. A far cry from the times I tried to post every day. I plead guilty to abandonment this time. No excuses. No claims of lack of material. I simply got bored of writing a blog that I felt no one reads. But then I figured what the hell right? I mean someone's going to read this sometime, and when they do, I hope they get as much fulfillment out of it as I do when I write it. Because ultimately thats all a writer wants. Sure he'd like his works to become a best-seller or a financial success, but the pleasure of writing is in that instant, as you lay down your pen, or shut down your computer, the feeling of accomplishment, thats what its all about.

Life is in the little things. Sure its the big things that everyone makes a big deal out of, but have you ever stopped to wonder why you consider somethings big and others small? Its based on your perception of how society would view them. Why is divorce a bigger deal than bad manners? You feel society would shun you more for the former than the latter, though in todays world you really cant be told. I'm sick of telling people and being told that somethings 'not a big deal'. The very reason for having to say that is because someone feels bad about something that happened. And so you really think you can make him feel better by saying its not important? Of course its important! Thats kind of why they were sad in the first place. Its just when its not so important to us,, we assume that things have the same priority to others. Thats something I learned the hard way. Priorities. One persons sense of whats important need not be yours. And I urge all my readers, (few that they are :) ) not to make the mistake of assuming that whats important to you must be important to someone else.

Knowing what you want, and going all out for it is a trait that must be admired, no matter what that thing may be. It could be a new car, or a new job, or even an impossible dream, but what matters is that its important to you, and even if others don't understand that, or tell you 'its not a big deal', shut them out and go for it!

This doesn't match my usual style at all, but I'm feeling good. Coming off a bad time, the world seems brighter again, don't get used to it my faithful reader(s). A storm never stays calm for long...