Back to life...

Back to reality...

I swear by the hair in my nostrils (for God said that we shouldn't swear by the hairs of our heads for we can't even count them) that I am not enjoying it.

I came back from my holidays re-energised, but mentally, once reality sunk in, I am once again depressed.

Going home brought some much needed rest into my system. A short hiatus from the issues that I left pending in KL, purposefully not wanting to think about them. And now that I am back, nothing has changed. The issues are still there. Some have mutated into a different issue, some new issues have popped up, and some are still waiting to be acted on.

My future is still not decided.

Going home brought up a entirely new issue with my parents. I mean, I can see that they are not getting any younger, and in time, will need someone to take care of. That goes for my girlfriend's side as well. We just sent off her brother to the States for his Tertiary pursuit, and as things go, he doesn't seem to be coming back to the small town to settle down any time soon. But of course, everything can change. Well, as things go, I am having this strong burden to go back and take care of my aging parents. I can't possibly bring them to KL and ask them to change their idyllic lifestyle for a meaningless existance in the big city with no friends, nothing to do, and 4 walls worth of an apartment.

But then, going home will present problems of its own for me and the plans that I have made for the next few years. Well, not that they are any good anyways.

I went around during my holidays, and seeing different things brought up different opportunities for me. Different ideas, different burdens. Some that I have to bear, some that I can choose to bear, some that if I so choose, my entire family will have to bear with me.

Sometimes, the burden of some unsaid responsibilities can be a very big factor in deciding your own future. What a lot of people theses days fail to realise is that your life is not just about yourself.

Liberal thinking promotes the advancement and the glorification of the INDIVIDUAL... but since when have Man been individuals?

No man is an island. And that is the truth. You don't get anywhere without friends, accomplices, and/or enemies.

The entire species of Man is societal.

As soon as you were born, you were born into a family that caters to bringing you up as the family can and knows best. So what gives us the right to declare ourselves as an individual as soon as we can become financially independant?

I think that independance and individualism is somewhat confused by a lot of people.

I have a lot of friends who, for the sake of escaping from the clutches of a doting mom, or authoritarian parents, want to move out of the house as soon as they possibly can. It's happening everywhere, and a lot of us don't actually know what we are doing.

When we move out and live by ourselves, we tend to forget how to live life as a family unit. It's actually a road of no return, severing the ties that bonds Man together as a family unit.

It's just wrong.

When you were born, you were born into a family who takes care of your every whimper. And imagine, if your parents left you to fend for yourselves when you were still a small baby/kid, how many times would you have died? Fever, coughs, and even the smallest of skin irritations could have killed you when you knew nothing better than to suckle at your mother's bossoms. Did they just put you into the hospital, and gave you money to pay for the bills and left you to fend for yourself?

But individualism dictates that most of the time, when your parents die, they die as individuals... Left alone by the sons and daughters who do not even have the slightest notion what family and responsibility means. When they grow old, they are given stacks and stacks of money just so that their every need is taken care of, save one... The need to have a relationship with their closest relations.

So you tell me that your parents aren't your responsibility since it was they who gave birth to you in the first place, and that you did not choose to be born into this life?? In that you are not responsible for their actions (of bringing you into this world)?

If they hadn't given birth to you initially, they would've suffered the same fate in having no one to care for them but themselves?

How individualistic and selfish indeed.

Have you failed to realise that as parents, they have never stopped giving?