O Fly On

It is a week night and it bewilders me how I have the time to be sitting down here, thinking of what to write as catharsis. Or maybe it is because it is a week night that I feel all the more strongly about penning down what I'm encountering in real time. I consider myself a bad timekeeper for only checking in here 13 days since the new year bells have rung, without uttering a single word about how my 2016 went. But then I realise these days that calendar years are but alarm clocks that remind us of the gradual yet intense pace that life is growing at, and there really is no such need for me to be always recollecting what I've achieved in the past 365 days, who I've lost and the regrets attached to every premature decision I had the task of making. And yet. There is still every reason to be reminding myself of why the year went the way it did, how each quarter of the year felt like a complete different milestone, and how fortunate I was to be on the receiving end of grace at every turn of my inexperienced life. For lack of a commonly all-embracing word, I am blessed. Blessed to have weathered the different facets of my journey - from completing a stint at a radio broadcasting company, resting in temporary unemployment, dabbling into my baking hobby by selling cakes, applying for jobs both locally and overseas, getting unexpected responses, to eventually passing my bar exams and getting the green light to pursue the infant stages of a legal career. It's amazing how each season felt like their separate story, how each situation demanded different expectations from me and I from them, how confused I was at which direction I was being pointed to, the burdening what-ifs.

But even then.

There lay an underlying connector that tied these stories together into one cohesive string. In the midst of it all, hearing from God was all I needed. A recent saying I have heard goes along the lines of, 'Life is a journey you must travel with a deep consciousness of God', and it is only now that I realise how resonating and true that statement is. A lesson I am very much carrying into the new year with me, and a reminder that even in the stormiest of days I will have the assurance of comfort, presence and control that anchor my very rocky boat.

Like many, my year has been one which has allowed me to seek opportunities in growth - there wasn't anything overly dramatic, but at the same time, the events that unfolded were in their rightful way significant and valuable to me. It strikes me that at the end of the day, we are all in our perfectly timed pursuits and there will come a day when we will reach an intersection with 'Where to Next?' signposts confronting us. I look ahead at the lane in front of me and it is blank, and that is how I envision my future season(s) to look like - an empty canvas waiting to be splashed with endless beautiful chances, transporting me from one hopeful possibility to the next.