Fail to imagine

JK Rowling delivers her Commencement Address, “The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination,” at the Annual Meeting of the Harvard Alumni Association on June 2008

Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.

It is not really half my lifetime ago where I was striking an uneasy balance, but half my lifetime ago, I had planted the seed for my dream job. And this seed caused the imbalance a few years later of which I relented too.

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view. There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you. What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty. They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience. Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression; it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.

Precisely why even after so many years had gone by and though I regretted never pursuing the vocation I wanted, I know I cannot blame my parents. They were not as open as they are now. A few years later, they did finally realised that what I wanted had immense potential but I had invested too much in my current vocation. And since the expiry date has been made effective, it had been my choice to not continue pursuing this dream vocation (at least not yet, I am still kiv-ing it). And thus while I did not experience poverty (yet, thankfully) and had accidentally gotten into a lucrative industry only to be kicked out (probably the only failure I tried to acknowledge though seriously, I felt it is just a wake-up call that I should be doing what I planted half my lifetime ago.) I strongly believed everything happens for a reason and I am convinced my current vocation has its merits to fulfil my dream job too.

I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

I asked doc if she remember what is my dream job. She is actually the only one I told exactly what it is (if my memory did not fail me.) The rest only had vague idea actually.. till today when I really had to made a decision and so had divulged to CL and my ex-colleague exactly what my dream job entails. Whether they remember it or not is another thing but that is of secondary importance to this point. This point is about “set free” because doc thought setting free is my dream job. Hmm. Can one really be set free though? However if…

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people’s places.

Then I guess it is true that one can truly be set free. Imagination sets one free. So..

One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise. And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

Fail to imagine. That is why I came up with this blog title. The failure to imagine, is the failure to be set free. And thus I am free all these while if I want to correct doc. Because I day-dream daily haha.

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality. That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people’s lives simply by existing.

Haha I did not blog at 18.. probably did write diary though but am too lazy to take it out. But I have written so many reviews of interesting articles over the years, and Steve Jobs’ Stay Hungry Stay Foolish was one of those which I had been triggered to remember today at a senior’s advice.

So if JK Rowling felt that at aged 18, in search of something she could not define then lead her to What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality

then for me at the year 2006, while in search of whether my masters is a wise choice gave me opportunities to make friends with people who shared with me Steve Job’s article that

Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college, but it was very, very clear looking backwards 10 years later. Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards, so you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something--your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever--because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference.

And so this time it is my choice to leave SAP industry (I could wait for opportunities I guess but I am disheartened with that industry already).

Which somehow reminds me of Steve Jobs when he was fired from Apple which turned out to be a blessing in disguise and allowed him to meet his wife.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

Do not settle because brick walls are there for a reason. But know when you should cut loss as sometimes the so-called brick walls are created by the devil. So is back to my question on resolve. Hmm...anyway back to JK Rowling's speech on imagination...

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped change. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.

As the empowerment card says, “to believe I am more powerful than I realise and instead of worrying what others think about me, I should use the power to make the world a better place”

So today, I wish you nothing better than similar friendships. And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.

I wish you all very good lives.

It is the journey that matters, the process and not the duration. It is the quality that matters. It is the sincerity that counts. I decided.. that I shall faster finish reading Elizabeth Gilbert Eat, Pray, Love and get my final conclusion.