I think the 20s is, symbolically, the
groundbreaking of anyone’s adult life. Yes, we all learn a lot of things while
we are students but, I believe, no amount of theoretical studies could fully
prepare us for life as an adult. As students we accumulate a lot of skills to
use for our future “dream” jobs but
our jobs is only a part, if not a small part, of our lives. Life, as it has
reminded me over and over again, is much more than the mundane.
Now, I am not an expert in the topic of
things-you-will-learn-during-your-20s. As a disclaimer, this is not a
Tuesdays-with-Morrie-ish kind of article. I am not about to give you the
secrets to a happy third decade of your life. What I am about to share are a
few things I learned during that time, things that makes me who I am now.
The power to decide is about as fearsome as it is exciting. For as long as we can remember, we
have been making decisions. When you were a kid and someone gave you a candy,
what you did with it – ate it right away, pocketed it for a later time or gave
it to someone else - was a decision. Decisions were not exactly new
during my 20s but decisions with lifelong consequences was a different story.
I remember the first time I realized how
being an “adult” was. There was
freedom. Freedom from the pressures given by an institution that dictates who I
will be 4 or 5 years from a certain time, who I currently am thru a series of
prerequisites taken and not taken and whether I was good enough thru a system
of feedback majorly dependent on examinations. I loved it for the sheer
possibility of being able to solely decide and dictate who I will be a day, a
month or a year from a certain time.
But after getting used to this freedom and finding myself having disjoint
pieces of plans and some blurred vision of a future 3 years after graduating, I
started longing for the same things I loathed – the curriculum, the program,
the tests.
Life as an “adult” was a life run by decisions. You decide where you want to go
and you decide how you’ll get there. Your friends and family could tell you
what they think is right or wrong but ultimately, what you, yourself, will take
as right or wrong will also be your decision. No one can directly tell you if
you’re on the right track to your dreams but what you will use as your gauge
will also be yours to decide.
What is essential is invisible to the eye. I’ve heard somewhere that traveling is good for the soul. Maybe it’s
because you’re out of your comfort zone or because you gain a different
perspective as you try to get to know a new culture or because of the simple
fact you get to see a new place that is not part of your everyday world.
Whatever it is, I firmly believe that traveling transforms people, especially
traveling abroad.
The last time I was out of the country due to
work was when I was 25. Out of all my out-of-the-country experiences, this was
the “grandest” as this was the farthest and the longest I have been away from
home. I traveled to Germany alone on an almost 14-hour trip inclusive of the
connecting flights, waiting time, getting lost and catching trains.
I remember as I was leaving the country, I
had no qualms. I was just excited, confident on my “traveling” abilities. However, the moment I reached the place I
was going to stay in for 2 months, I suddenly found myself crying. Without any
means to contact my non-techie parents - no load, no skype, no YMs - and
without a friend physically present to talk to, the thought of being miles away
from home with a 6-hour time difference and lots of oceans in between that I
wouldn’t be able to cross even if I wanted to, I wanted to go home.
I may have not consciously realized it back
then but I knew this was a defining moment in my life. This was the time I
realized that no amount of money could compensate for the loss of not being
able to spend quality time with your loved ones. Time, particularly time spent
with people who matter in my life, was more essential than any material thing.
Love is the fuel that will make us go on. At the risk of sounding negative, let me say, life is a series of
routines. We wake up, take a bath, commute to work, go to work, work for - give
and take - 8 hours, commute from work, get ready to sleep and then, wake up
again the next day. This happens for majority of our days, 5 to 6 days a week
for 52 weeks in a year. I’m not really the suicidal type but if we just look at
what happens in our days and realize that this is what majorly composes what we
do with our life, what is the point of living then? These were the thoughts I
had when I was in my late 20s. Initially, I viewed the question as a rhetorical
one, but eventually, I had my answer.
If we are going to look at life as the series
of events we do day in and day out, then, there is really no point in living.
But, this is not why we live. We live because of the love that surrounds us –
the love that we receive and the love that we give. Without love, everything is
pointless. We don’t work because of working per se, we work because we love to
provide to the people we love. We don’t wake up for the sole purpose of waking
up, we wake up and stand up from our beds because we know that what we will do
is something that will benefit our loved ones, directly or indirectly. Love is
what propels us to move. It is the reason why we continue to live – the
physical breathe-in-the-air kind of living as well as the earning-money kind of
living.
Its been10 years since I graduated from
college and transitioned over to the “real
world”. In that decade, and at one point during that time, I started to
wear a lot of hats - a taxpayer, a commuter, a driver, a Frisbee enthusiast, a
breadwinner, a wife, a tita, a cook, a
student, an engineer, a developer, a jetsetter, a Japanese culture addict, etc.
I suddenly found myself needing to fulfill a number of responsibilities that it
wasn’t exactly hard to loose myself.
Now, it is not my goal for you to adapt the
things I learned and take it as your own truth. My simple desire in writing
this is to challenge you to look at the things life is teaching you and use it
to define who you are. We will be a lot of things in our life – some, at one
point after another and some, all at once – but these “things” is not who you are. Do not let life define you. Instead,
define what your life is going to be. Get to know who you really are by knowing
the principles you believe in and the things you hold firm in your heart.
