Sakinah Abdul Aziz

You know this whole experience when you keep your head looking towards that one door. You walk towards it and reach out for the doorknob only to find out that that it is only a figment of your imagination and that there isn't any door. Perhaps then you got to start paving for another route. "Redirect to another source" This was such a timely anecdote and a very wise reminder. Each time I start seeking and scrambling for another source, I need to be reminded that there is that one true Source that never fails. And I need to always keep coming back. There will always be moments when we are being steered away but being called back. Moments when we walk farther away but we keep coming back. To that one source. Like an anchor that grounds you. Like a compass that directs you.

I've never really seen myself as live of the party according to the Western standards. But if we re-define this as someone who cracks jokes, makes exaggerated movements, getting conversations moving at a rapid pace and infecting laughter and humour through ones own laughter for extended periods and being in a crowd of 8, maybe that could have been me last night. But the conclusion of this is the realisation that I have indeed burst my own energy tank. Because my tank has shrunk through time. 3 hour of non-stop laughter, cracking jokes and playing games, I thought I could have fainted or died. My head was throbbing and weariness and fatigue overcame me. Can't remember the last time I was like this but it must have been ages ago since I can no longer handle the after effects of being extremely extroverted. Signs of aging.

One could fall in love with an idea. Like a magnet, it sticks on you. Like a boomerang, it comes back to you with every swing in efforts to push it away. It latches on the mind. It refuses to go away. It makes you run through it in the mind, countless replays and reruns. And the more you let it play before you, the more attractive it becomes. This idea delights you, it energizes you. It overwhelms you with all its perfection, its beauty. So pure, as if nothing could taint it. It is perfect. The heart wants to indulge in it. Yet it becomes to appear much like an obsession, an unhealthy indulgence, an addiction. It is out of sight, but it is in the mind. Like a parasite which has been feeding off the brain long enough to make the mind its own home, spreading wildly and vividly. This idea, it seems real. It seems real more than anything else. And yet, this idea just stays in the mind. This idea is just.. an idea.  What is it about you?  Maybe it isn't about the mind after all....

'When you know that language, it's easy to understand that someone in the world awaits you, whether it's in the middle of the desert or in some great city. And when two such people encounter each other, and their eyes meet, the past and the future become unimportant. There is only that moment, and the incredible certainty that everything under the sun has been written by one hand only. It is the hand that evokes love, and creates a twin soul for every person in the world. Without such love, one's dreams would have no meaning. "Maktub", thought the boy.' ― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

'Whoever said in what is He, held that He is contained; and whoever said on what is He held He is not on something else. He is a Being but not through phenomenon of coming into being. He exists but not from non-existence. He is with everything but not in physical nearness. He is different from everything but not in physical separation. He acts but without connotation of movements and instruments. He sees even when there is none to be looked at from among His creation. He is only One, such that there is none with whom He may keep company or whom He may miss in his absence.' - Ali Ibn Abi Talib (a.s.) Source: Nahjul Balagha: Peak Of Eloquence

The great thing about residing in a place for about one and a half decades together with some others, you really see how people have grown. You enter the lift, and you start to observe. Like you've always known how this person would turn out totally gorgeous when she hits the peak of her youth. Or like, you sorta draw some links between smoking and weight loss because the girl who was always seen smoking has gotten really skinny. Or you learnt how hormones did not seem very fair to some teenage growing boys, because look how those young lanky boys outgrown you and how presentable and tall they've become. Or, like how you used to wonder which grade the other uniform-clad neighbours are in and now you are wondering what are their occupation. And you also realize, how those white hair is slowly peeking out among the black strands, how their shoulders tend to slouch and how small their frames have become. You notice how some are accompanied by their other halves and how som...

Sometimes it's like that, isn't it? You clench your fist and then you unclench. Clench and unclench. Clench and unclench. When you start to unclench, you tell yourself, "Let it go, let it go." Because in the first place, it isn't something you are capable of holding on for too long, or even if at all. Afterall, you are only grasping air.

Somehow I had forgotten how it was like. Like how when you try to rummage through your memories of you being 4, you can barely retrieve anything but flashing pictures. Vague flashes. Like a video being fast-forwarded. Sketches. Mere sketches with very little details. Not much colour, no hints of sound. And what only remained are just ideas and theories of what it was. Descriptive, objective, detached. Somehow I had forgotten how it felt like. And the replaying of the beautiful words spoken in my mind of how blissful that once felt, these soon are only remembered through the familiarity of speech. And what only remained are the mere movements of my lips, carrying meaning that was no longer felt. Now, I just can't remember. No matter how significant and beautiful the memory of it was. Life is really a series of fleeting moments.

"In the midst of hate, I found there was, within me, an invincible love. In the midst of tears, I found there was, within me, an invincible smile. In the midst of chaos, I found there was, within me, an invincible calm. I realized, through it all, that In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer. And that makes me happy. For it says that no matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger – something better, pushing right back." - Albert Camus

Of course nobody likes the flu bug. We groan and sigh because we just have that too many things to do that we cannot afford to fall sick. And then we blame the "bug", or the people whom we have come in contact with 24 hours prior to experiencing the first onset of flu (normally would be a terrible sore throat for me). But of course at the end of the day, we blame ourselves for failing to immunize ourselves against these viruses and bacteria floating around in the hot, humid Singapore air. To have come to this point, I am aghast at how we tend respond to falling sick. Sometime back, I was down with a mild fever (and probably a diarrhea that did not really manifest itself very well, thankfully) after my weekend trip in Bintan, and what I suspected, after savouring the delectable street food. On Monday, I went to see the doctor and I was given a 2-days MC as he was afraid I had dengue. But of course, I had too many things to do, I stubbornly went back to work on Tuesday, an...