The complicated reality of the past.
I had a sort of aha moment a few months ago that sort of made me sad, to be honest. It’s nothing great or anything, my ah-ha moment. Actually, I suppose many of us do think about it occasionally but rarely ponder on it deeply.
Finishing university was a scary yet exciting time for me. I was ready to carve my future and made sure decisions I made would be histories that I would be proud of in the future. I wanted to be in so many shoes but was so afraid to path my way to wear them that I occasionally opted for other options instead. Plans changed last minute, but so far, things are falling into place; not exactly, but at least it’s going somewhere.
My aha moment came when I realized how obsessed I became with creating a future for myself where my future FUTURE (yes, double) self would not regret (of my past). Does that make sense? And then it dawned on me that as much as I am given the opportunity to create my future and ultimately, ‘change’ it any time I want, I realized that I can’t change my past.
I know what you must be thinking, “But isn’t that how it is though? We can’t change the past. That’s life’s basic rule, Jasmine.” And yeah, I agree but I never really pondered on that sad fact; that my past is fixed and everything that happened in it cannot be changed.
Like how I cannot change the fact that I quit Karate at 13 when I should’ve continued it maybe not as a career, but a form of work out. I cannot change the fact that I should have continued my Mandarin classes in high school so that it would be better, much better. I cannot change the fact that I would never be a daddy’s girl and would never know what that means or how that is because our past disabled us of such relationship, but that’s okay because we have each other and that’s all that matters.
