Defisiensi Disiplin

Defisiensi Disiplin

Akhir tahun ini, umur saya akan menginjak angka 28. Artinya, lebih dekat ke kepala tiga dibanding 25 – yang biasanya adalah batas usia untuk masih pantas disebut young adult. Agak aneh, mengingat kalau saya bertemu dengan orang-orang berusia dua puluhan awal saya masih suka berpikir, “Oh, masih satu generasi lah ya kita.” Hingga saya sadari, adik saya sendiri usianya sudah 21 tahun saat ini, dan kami bahkan lahir di milenium yang berbeda! Bahkan mungkin saya adalah salah satu acuan baginya saat memikirkan contoh figur orang dewasa. Yang dianggap dan diharap sudah bisa memegang penuh kontrol akan hidup masing-masing beserta segala tanggung jawab dan konsekuensinya.

Padahal, salah satu yang paling sulit dari menjadi dewasa bagi saya justru adalah mengelola self-control. Tahun ini sudah tahun keenam saya hidup tanpa rutinitas dan jadwal yang ditentukan oleh sistem, namun rasanya saya masih tergopoh-gopoh dalam memegang kemudinya.

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Shifting the source of joy to the everyday things

Shifting the source of joy to the everyday things

Among other things, which are mostly the awful ones, the pandemic has strangely helped me reevaluate many views in my life. One of them is the realization that the common mindset of “work isn’t meant to be happy, it’s meant to be done so you can use your paycheck to afford things that make you happy” may not only be outdated, but also a little peculiar. I used to live by that motto, thinking that it doesn’t matter if I have to spend more than half of my awake time every day dealing with things that are less interesting than my leisure activities. Because at the end of the day, I get paid for it, and I can then use my income to afford things that not only I genuinely love about, but also won’t be able to afford otherwise, such as travelling.

But I never noticed how sad that idea might sound, until the pandemic.

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Abu Dhabi & Dubai, UAE (2019)

Abu Dhabi & Dubai, UAE (2019)

It was around midnight local time, and I remember looking out the window to watch thousands of silver specks scattered among the pitch-black sky for quite some uninterrupted time, feeling at ease. That week had gone extremely fast, and I could hardly believe I was already flying above the Indian Ocean by the end of it. I had no time to process anything, as I was only allowed to make decisions after decisions. And there I was, in that window seat, off to another phase that I was both excited and terrified about.

I tried to record what I was feeling, as those eight hours would be the first time in that week where I got to sit back and not be in a rush. But I could only come up with a tweet draft, which never saw the light of day anyway.

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Practicing acceptance for a guilt-free stagnation

Practicing acceptance for a guilt-free stagnation

It doesn’t feel quite right saying this, but if there’s anything good that the pandemic has taught me, it’s about self-compassion.

I guess we can all agree that the entire world collectively tearing apart is one acceptable excuse for how you haven’t been behaving like the “better,” more functional version of you. I myself have been abandoning so many things that were once a part of my routine, that I now feel guilty about.

It’s funny that ironically, the reason why I’ve come back to doing something through writing here is because I’m posting a tedious trilogy of self-loathing regarding: 1) how I haven’t felt good in months, 2) how I’ve been hating myself due to my extremely low level of productivity, and 3) how I hate myself for judging me based on my level of productivity when in fact, I’ve also done a few personal milestones that I never expected to do otherwise. Sure, these things aren’t resume-worthy and more of a leap forward in my self-healing journey, but these really are the things that define who I am when any resume-related labels such as work positions or school are stripped out of my identity.

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When does a break become too much break?

When does a break become too much break?

At the beginning of the pandemic, I had my fair periods of bursting productivity. I completed my step-one fixed step training at work ahead of time, aced my French exam, went to the class twice a week virtually, wrote more than 20 poems for my portfolio website, revamped my childhood bedroom to an adult workspace, started a new obsession with houseplants and even created Excel spreadsheet to document its well-being updates, got myself a piano keyboard and taught myself from zero, regularly read papers and articles about planetary geology, started volunteering again, and the list goes on.

Yet a few months later, here I am, spending all my free time in the last few months either cuddling with my cat or binge-watching some shitty TV shows because I’ve run out of the good ones to watch. There’s no crap left to be given for things other than these two. Work hasn’t felt stimulating in a while either – and I probably haven’t been very receptive to new challenges too recently. I didn’t even have the willingness to spare some time to write here again. I gained some weight because I don’t exercise, I haven’t put my skincare on in months, and I’m only capable of the bare minimum of household tasks in the house, i.e. drying clothes and vacuum-cleaning. I’ve let my parents water my houseplants, a few died, and it’s been a month since the last time I checked on each one of them carefully.

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Is gratitude a prison?

Is gratitude a prison?

There was this conversation between Randall, the adopted son of the Pearson family, and Kevin, his non-biological brother in This Is Us S05E13 that had been stuck with me for a while. It’s when Randall admitted that the fact that he was adopted by a family he loves so much makes him feel that he is bound to show nothing but gratitude at all times, while that feeling, truthfully, feels like an emotional prison because oftentimes he still couldn’t help but thinking about all the what-if’s had he been living with his biological parents instead his whole life. And Kevin said he sounds “wildly ungrateful.”

And I’ve been thinking about that ever since. The feeling of having to constantly show gratitude because people might perceive you to live a somewhat ideal life, when the truth is, sometimes you just want to lash out because things haven’t felt okay in a prolonged time, and let the world watch you go nuts in 4K if they please.

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