Changes

It's been two years since I graduated. I remember when I first decided to stay back on this island, I had three specific reasons (which I'm not going to disclose). Whether or not they were 'man-made' reasons, even so, I had already made a choice. I felt a strong desire to be 'left behind' not knowing exactly why.


2010.

“The heart has reasons that reason does not understand.”
Jacques Benigne Bossuel.

Looking back, my whole life must've somehow been planned out. There's really no other way to it. Every now and then, I'll get into this trance of recalling back what made me put my two feet down on this ground - this island - and honestly, until today, I can't really put a finger on what those reasons were. I realized, however, that those three reasons I had (of which I have 'fulfilled' all of them) were merely temporal reasons, reasons that could not truly give me a rooted purpose. Maybe, just maybe, those reasons were excuses for me to escape from things I do not want to face. I guess that's the beauty and mystery of hindsight altogether, it gives a somewhat clearer picture but yet never fully comprehensible.


2009.

“The way to see by Faith is to shut the Eye of Reason.”
Benjamin Franklin

My reasons for staying back begin to dissipate. One by one, I managed to accomplish all I wanted to do in Penang and before I know it, one year has passed me by. But as I've said, my life must've been planned out word by word, page by page. When all my reasons for staying back dissolved, I really had no excuses left, no concrete pillar of which I could cling on to. Then came along this "person" who oh-so-conveniently decided to drop me a much bigger reason to stay back a little longer (and mind you, "little" is really an understatement). I wrestled with him for a long time but as I looked back, I realized I was wrestling with myself rather than with him. His reason was very clear. The problem was, I couldn't accept it. I couldn't understand and I did not have all the answers to the 'whys'. I was trying to rationalise, to reason with myself and what I needed to do. Faith took a back seat.


Present.

"For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. "
The Bible (Ephesians 1: 4-6)

Do I still asks myself why am I still here on this Island? Sure I do. But not so much as to question or to doubt myself, more so as a reminder. A reminder to myself that I had been chosen for a very specific task, one that has been given to me way before I knew I was going to do my form 6, way before I knew I gotten USM as my university. A purpose that has been embedded in me even before the creation of the world.

Reason dissolves, purpose sustains.