The Edge of Glory

I’m on the edge of glory
And I’m hanging by a moment of truth
I’m on the edge of glory
And I’m hanging by a moment with you
~Lady Gaga~

Work resumes tomorrow as the unprecedented version of reckless behaviour reaches it’s final page. Despite seemingly aimless weeks of restless recklessness, living productively should sooner rather than later commence.

Though this interval between chapters is at it’s finale, one can’t honestly claim that it won’t be missed. This breath of fresh air – or what some may declare as freedom – must be exhaled, however slowly, however abruptly. But in spite of countless moments of breathing, it’s the days that take your breath away which are the ones you mark in history.

However, even history itself renders it’s problems. What was will never change, but if the past is what hinders your present from aligning with future, it must either be eliminated or diminished. History will not repeat itself, but the scars left behind are only reminders of why we are what we are today. I am who I am today because of the choices I made yesterday. But who I am tomorrow is determined by what I do today. And that, is what makes us human. The fact that we have a choice – we are a result of ourselves.

What we do, who we meet, who we keep and when we make those choices determine the “why” in all our unanswered questions in life. The explanation behind all inexplicability; the reason behind irrationality. And to rationalise what was never meant to be understood, merely experienced, diminishes the capacity of reaching ones full potential.

We cannot become limitless until we are pushed beyond our limits. The pinnacle of our capacity never reached until this capacity is stretched.

If life was an elastic band, every pull, every tug only gets us further to where we need to be.

So paint me your canvas so I become what you could never be. ~Shinedown~

If You Ever Come Back

There’ll be a smile on my face and the kettle on
And it’ll be like you were never gone
If you ever come back
~The Script~

A city like Hong Kong breed many a soul concerned with control and the obsessive need to determine the course of one’s own actions. Each individual reaches a point in life where interpersonal relationships and events within one’s comfort zone become no more than mere distractions hindering full potential. However, when the course of actions is no longer what one can control – thus, if circumstances predict almost every outcome and consequence – making an effort will only ease and sooth the impact of the blow, but does not eliminate it entirely.

Some hold back in fear of getting hurt, others simply because they can’t handle the intensity of a deeper, darker reality of life. Many are sheltered from darkness, and each little scratch is the end of the world. But for those who have been dead and dead again have a capacity stretching beyond humane.

Departure and separation are only inevitable, but the process of losing someone you once loved sprouts confusion and aggression. Yet knowing changes everything – having expectations helps determine one’s each and every next move. Knowing when to say what needs to be said, knowing when to make an effort and when to hold back.

And most importantly, knowing how to express what is not meant to be suppressed.

The sad reality of life is that we try to control what was never meant to be controlled, because when we lose all inhibitions and let life take its course, we reach our potential capacity.

And when you truly love someone, you exceed expectations and go beyond the capacity you originally reached.

And right now there’s a war between the vanities
But all i see is you and me
The fight for you is all I’ve ever known
So come home
~One Republic~

Everybody’s Changing

Trying to make a move just to stay in the game
Trying to stay awake to remember my name
But everybody’s changing
and I don’t feel the same.
~Keane~

Change is inevitable, but despite the gradual pace of this so-called change, the sudden impact of its consequences hits you right in the face and you do a double-take just trying to stay alive.

Every move makes a significant difference – every anticipated outcome – changes everything.

We say things we can’t take back, we miss what we never had… and in missing the concept of us, if there never really was an us, then aren’t we simply missing the potential of there being an us rather than an actual us?

Every high plummets to its abyss before rising back up again, each time stronger but more battered.

But happiness shouldn’t be a pre-set concept – there shouldn’t be a timeframe. Yet to enter into an adventure with the expectation that it will end, only because history has never ceased to disappoint, makes me wonder if that timeframe of happiness is worth the risk?

When perfection lands itself on your doorstep, you don’t ruin the memory of it with a doormat. But simultaneously, you want to keep that perfection all to yourself, because you don’t want anyone else to ruin it.

Yet like a work of art, it is only perfect because there are imperfections – and when one can see the flaws as beauty rather than as hinderances, the only setback is self-doubt.

And when there is self-doubt, there needs courage; and if pain is inevitable regardless of the choice, why not take the choice that maximizes happiness for both parties.

Without an expectation that there will be an end.
Without the preset expiration date.
Without an unreasonable standard of measurement.

Without any form of measurement whatsoever.

The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

~Marcel Proust~

I need another story
Don’t need another perfect lie.
~One Republic~

Catch Your Fall

It’s that time
To sink or swim I try
To be stronger inside
And rise above myself
~Gavin Mikhail~

Seeing someone rise from the ashes of your past, you’re reminded of that person you once were, that version of yourself that you rightfully walked away from.

The scars resurrect from the graves of where we buried them alive – the memories of each cut, each stab, follow us like a lingering shadow trying to find its home again.

Then you notice the small smile creeping across the edges, enveloping every deflection you once used to justify walking away. That little curve and ever so tiny spark in the eye relights a fire that makes you wonder if it was ever out.

That reminder of who you used to be – the you that you bid farewell – you now stare at from the other side and miss that inexperience that past-you had. You miss that ignorance, that innocence; but experience weighs you down.

And you want to walk away again, from the reminders of your past – the good and the bad.

For the good is as enticing and catastrophically hypnotic, because we know that there was a point in life where that version of us was all we could be; that version of us satisfied us.

That version made us happy, however temporary.

Yet the bad evokes the pain we now learnt to suppress, the anguish we now learn to oversee; the agony we now deem trivial; the scars we now curtain.

And yet goodbyes are never forever – because who we were is the maker of who we are; and who we are is the murderer of who we were.

There is no perfect crime – traces of our past closeted in every corner, becoming a Monster of Dust building its power: the longer we leave it unattended, the stronger it gets.

The older our history, the greater the impact. If our lives were a catapult, the longer we trace back the harder the hit into the present. But without going back, there is no way forward…

If I ever had a real chance to travel in a time machine
Where would I go?
Probably wouldn’t wanna see the past
Cuz all the memories are enough.
~Example~

One More Time

When you look back to this day I want you to be able to say that you would gladly do it again ~Akon~

The present was once the far-fetched future man was sure would never arrive. Once a dream, now a reality; once a reality, now a memory.

With the future seemingly intangible, what guarantee is there that tomorrow will arrive? If tomorrow never comes for you or for me, one of us will have to face the future alone. And whether that be with a new better-half or forever reveling in the fact that the best ever is now a memory, the present will only ever be as good as the future gets.

Yet when the future becomes the present, which present is the best: the memory or the actual present?

Dreams of the future so elusive, but current happenings around us can’t even be perceived as concrete. Whatever can be manipulated or logiced into sense, however distorted or irrational, is within our control. Thus, nothing is abstract, nor absolute.

Except that statement.
Or is it?

There is no 100% because man is selfish – we give only to get. For it is mans instinct to survive, thus nothing will be done unless survival is ensured. There can be no giving unless there is something for the taking.

In others, we find what we are lacking. In ourselves, we give what it takes to gain what we’re lacking.

No sacrifice is absolute; no love is agape.

Because as a human, every breath we give back to the earth is every breath we expect to take in.

take me as I am or step aside cuz I bring my own heartbeat.

‘Cause You’re Free
To Do What You Want To Do
You’ve Got To Live Your Life
Do What You Want To Do ~Ultra Nate~

 

This Is War

It’s the moment for truth and the moment to lie
The moment to live and the moment to die
The moment to fight
~30 Seconds to Mars~

Should my thoughts continue to remain an entangled web clouding my mind, as intellect and academia - rationale and logic – struggle to wade through the baggage of repitive thoughts.

Memories coincide with fantasies, thus creating a blockage disabling logic and reason from performing its (ironically) profound miracle in aiding ones’ reality.

For if these thoughts do not find its concrete and immediate release, I fear the invasion of the inner over-throwing the robust frontier in which many a year was taken at its construction. For if the irrational, impulsive and impatient inner being over-takes the secure, confident and decisive stronger being, all bricks fall to dust and the Greater Wall of China no longer defines the relationship between love and hate.

Intellect has always been my greatest virtue, but when it becomes any less, there is an obvious indication that the poison of emotion is becoming to take over. The fact that one years to be controlled rather than controlling means the surrender for each and every aspect, not just the fantastical.

Thus should this be a final decision, to surrender to will rather than reason, the bare consequences must be bore.

For if one is to continue on their lonely path of security, safety and concrete values, perhaps there is something definite and tangible. But those who seek higher knowledge will forever be alone in a world of their own knowledge and experience.

Yet to surrender to the futile yet obscured and incandescent power of the inner being would mean risking the soul over-taking the mind: the abstract over-taking reason.

And in matters so abstract, perhaps its best allow reason to determine its due course rather than leave fate in the hands of something so fluid.

For this is the first time in a very, very long pause in history where the soul and mind engage in a head-to-head (or dare I say head-to-heart) battle for its position in physical life.

For the physical to manifest, both sides must first battle.

So now…

This is war.

It’s a beautiful lie
It’s a perfect denial
Such a beautiful lie to believe in

Everyone’s looking at me
I’m running around in circles,
A quiet desperation’s building higher
I’ve got to remember this is just a game.
~30 Seconds to Mars~

No Boundaries

I fought the limit to stand on the edge
What if today is as good as it gets?
~Adam Lambert~

Just when you think the world is going nowhere, those days when you think you’ve done everything you possibly can, waiting for time to do what it does best and reveal whatever it is we’ve been waiting for…

Those days, the process of waiting – whether it be for a doctor’s appointment, for a lunch order, for a university degree, or even for a potential relationship – but the process of not knowing when it will come through is endearingly tedious. At first, the wait is bearable, the knowledge that you’re venturing out to get what you want, then wait for it. But after a while, after a very long while, when your lunch order still hasn’t arrived, or your doctor keeps you in the waiting room, but after that very long while, you start to wonder if it was worth waiting for in the first place.

And then it arrives.

Just when you thought it’s time to give up and find a new doctor, to order a new lunch set, to change majors, to find a new lover etc.

And they surprise you.

Or they disappoint.

Sometimes you feel like you’re giving so much of yourself,
But you’re not receiving anything definitive.

Those days you start questioning why
When all you have to do is close your eyes
Let time work its magic and in its passing
It stumbles upon you – gives you something lasting.

Despite all the effort and thought put into something which one isn’t even sure is coming, the fact of the matter is whatever you’re waiting for is still real, regardless of if it arrives. It’s a dream, because you have something to dream about. It’s a fantasy, because it’s not yet tangible.

But at the end of the day, it’s still real.

And that’s as real as it gets.

Every word,
However sweet, however real
Sounds so distant.
Now they float so effortlessly past me
As if they were meant for somebody else.
~When Five Fell~