Category: Life

  • Victims and Oppressors

    It seems I created quite a stir with my views about depression and mental disorders. It’s somewhat concerning that so many people took exception to what I had to say, but hardly anyone was concerned about the vagueness and generality of the original post that encouraged professional intervention for ‘personality quirks’. 

    Worse still is the fact that hundreds of people were willing to reblog my post just to create a platform for them to hurl abuse and vulgarity at me without even trying to engage or understand the context thereof. There were a few exceptions, and where I felt it was worth my time, I dropped a note to each of them to either thank them for engaging sincerely, or to clarify my perspectives. 

    The reality is that victims are more likely to act aggressively than anyone else. In my life, whenever I was attacked physically or verbally by others, it was always plainly evident that they were responding irrationally simply because they were unable to  justify their position, or were too distracted by their self-defeating behaviours to realise that there can be an alternate view that holds merit.

    As Muslims, we believe that one of the signs of the hour approaching is that killing will become common place. Even just typing this simple line leaves me cringing at the thought of the feeble-minded that will use it to further entrench the stereotypes that they are force fed through the mass media. Nonetheless, the point is simple. The more we embellish our lives with half-truths, the less likely we are to be able to grasp the truth even if it stares us blankly in the face. 

    We live in extremes. It’s rare to find people that live as equals, but very common to find people living as victims or oppressors. All the shades of grey, let alone the colours of the rainbow, have been stifled out of our lives because we’ve become such a polarised species. 

  • Sadness is…

    Sadness is that moment when you gently lift your cup to your lip to savour that last sip of honey-sweetend Earl Grey tea only to discover that your cup is empty. :’(

  • Nostalgic Deception

    Flipping through some old sets of postcards that I bought on my very first trip abroad, I felt an inclination to want to reminisce about that trip as if it was such a beautiful experience. You know, those memories that you see through rose coloured spectacles pretending that everything was perfect with the world and you felt like you belonged? That’s the hint of an emotion that I had when I looked through those postcards. But I knew immediately that I would be lying to myself if I tried to believe that to be true.

    My first trip out of my home country was to the Holy Lands of Makkah and Madinah. It was a life long wish that was finally fulfilled. I didn’t plan it. I didn’t even have a passport when I decided to travel. I recall taking a few weeks’ leave from work, sitting around by myself in Cape Town while working away from home, wondering what I was going to do for the time I had to myself. The weekend passed, then Monday dragged on and suddenly on Tuesday I had this a-ha moment. I decided to make the trip of a lifetime. Alone. 

    I visited the travel agent on Tuesday, submitted my application for an emergency passport on Wednesday, collected my passport on Thursday afternoon, flew to Johannesburg on Thursday night, submitted my passport on Friday morning for my Saudi visa, received the visa on Friday afternoon, and flew to Jeddah on Saturday. It was an impossible achievement by any measure had it been planned to happen that way, but it happened. As usual, I didn’t allow myself a breather to even think about what I was doing. 

    The trip was amazing and heartbreaking in ways I never imagined. It was eventful as well, with Turkish Airlines losing my luggage, and hopping down onto the runway one wheel at a time, we finally landed in Jeddah. I caught my connecting flight to Madinah and was fortunate enough to be bumped up to Business Class for the whole 45 minute flight. I was extorted of money by a taxi driver in Madinah, and physically thrown out of the mosque by the arrogant Saudi guards for not finishing my prayer in time for them to start cleaning that section of the mosque. I then made my way to Makkah and despite the splendour and majesty of the city, I felt isolated amongst the thousands of visitors that spent many hours in the Holy Mosque. I felt incomplete, like I had always felt my entire life. 

    This was my dream trip that came true, yet i wanted to leave without delay. So much so, that I cut my trip short by 3 days, changed my return flight and headed home just days after the massive earthquake that devastated Turkey. As fate would have it, I spent a day in Istanbul as part of my stopover on my way back to South Africa. I walked through the city attracting the strangest looks, greetings, and sometimes hugs because of my appearance. I had a full beard and I wore the traditional Muslim dress for men, both of which was outlawed for Turkish men at the time. Of course I had no idea I was being such a rebel. 

    The most memorable moment that day was when I sat down for lunch in a local restaurant, alone, minding my own business, when suddenly the wall next to my table started slapping against my leg. As usual, hardly anything phased me, so I sat there and watched everyone else screaming and shouting as they ran out into the streets panic-stricken at the intensity of the after shock. When I looked around, I noticed that it was just the owner and me left in the restaurant. He smiled at me and with his finger wagging in the air, he just said, “Zil Zaal, Zil Zaal”, which is ‘earthquake’ in Arabic. I returned his smile and continued to eat my lunch while the waiters returned to get sugar water for the petrified patrons that were outside in the street.

    As much as there is to remember, the memory feels like just another memory. Nothing sweet, nothing amazing, nothing extraordinary. Just another memory. I’ve never felt at ease in myself, let alone with myself, and throughout all my travels, that dis-ease has been my most loyal travel partner. I was born restless, and I suspect that the restlessness will only ever recede when I take my last breath. Before that moment, I pray that I am protected from myself, and that others are protected from me, because a restless soul is capable of much hurt without intent. But I know how to be nothing else. 

  • Another Vicious Cycle

    Man is incapable of perfection, yet I expect it of others, and demand it of myself. Even in the latitude that I allow myself and others around me, I expect perfection in their compliance with such boundaries all the while fooling myself that my flexibility flies in the face of my perfectionist tendencies. Nonetheless, I strive for perfection in pursuit of efficiency because any inefficiency irks me with the realisation that energy is being consumed on something that could be avoided. I’m lazy like that.

    The circular debate that rages in my head leaves me exhausted enough not to be able to fulfil my expectations of myself. It’s a tedious cycle. Feeling too tired to do what I know needs to be done, then feeling disgruntled by the fact that I’m not making the progress I’d hoped for, followed by the disillusionment at the realisation that I’m too tired to maintain the presence of mind required to complete the tasks at hand. 

    Feels like a dog chasing its tail, or the donkey in hot pursuit of the dangling carrot. I pray I’m not the only one with this affliction, because there is much comfort that can be gained by witnessing our shortcomings in others. It suddenly makes us feel human and less than incompetent. 

  • Brain dump…almost

    This icy weather, failed attempts at parenting and hyper-acidity are recipes for a very depressive night. But there’s enough positivity to keep me grounded in reality, rather than allow me to slip into a morbid state. Nonetheless it’s the type of mood that prompts mass un-follows and bulk deletions of posts, but for now, I’ll resist the urge for both.

    Waiting for the calm, for the ease or the breather between life’s throes continues to be a futile exercise. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a meaningful and therapeutic brain dump, but even an attempt at that leaves me staring blankly at my screen. I discovered that the secret to overcome this is to write about the blankness when staring at the screen. So this is my brain dump. A post of seeming nothingness from a brain incapable of much right now.

    There’s always just one more thing before I should be at ease. Always one more thing I need to do or get out of the way, or one more thing that needs to be achieved. If only I can just get past this or just get that resolved, then I’ll be able to focus on what I need to, or rather want to. But I suspect that this same cycle of insanity is what causes people to lay in their death beds wondering where they lost sight of what was important.

    The philosopher’s view of life is insensitive, although often truthful. Right now, philosophy is a cold comfort in the face of dis-ease. It’s the kind of uneasiness that rears its ulcerous head when my energy levels are lowest, and the brain clutter is highest. It’s the burden of being conscious. Not awake. Conscious. Aware. It’s tiring. Even when nothing is wrong, the realisation of how little it takes to make everything go wrong nags like an annoying itch that can’t be reached because it’s in between the skin and the bone, but not quite in either and scratching it only causes it to flare, but rarely to abate. 

    That’s reality. That annoying bit between the head and the heart that can’t be fully rationalised, nor fully dismissed. What a ramble of bull!

  • Erm…that’s like saying that if you’re a vegetarian and you stand in front of a raging bull, it won’t charge at you. Hmmm…nah, that won’t work. That’s like expecting life to treat you well just because you’re a good person. Hmmmm…nah, that doesn’t happen. So me thinks this is crap.

    (Source: http://only-the-unloved-hate.tumblr.com/)

  • The gentle souls that touch my life in my later years inevitably bear the brunt of the lessons learnt at the hands of the despicable souls in my earlier years.

    CJ

  • think…think…think…think…think…think…

    I think till it pales me, and then I observe how my thinking pales me, and then I observe how my observation of my thinking pales me. And the cycle continues until I have no energy nor inclination to think, at which point my brain switches off, my emotions go into neutral, I quite unconsciously assume a detached disposition and I appear as cold and insensitive as a sociopath. Worse still, thoughts that can only be entertained by a sociopath start trickling through my head until suddenly I realise how detached I am, how sullen I appear, and how fatigued my body is, and it prompts a burst of consciousness that jolts me out of that stupor and into a flurry of thoughts and passion and creativity that manifests itself in flirtatious and endearing behaviour that leaves most bewildered at the sudden change in temperament.

    I’m not moody. Sometimes I just succumb to the weight of life. The gentle souls that touch my life in my later years inevitably bear the brunt of the lessons learnt at the hands of the despicable souls in my earlier years. What didn’t kill me didn’t make me stronger, it only made me more jaded, but progressively more impatient. I keep lying to myself thinking that survival implies strength, when in fact it simply implies adaptability. Knowing how to dodge the bullet doesn’t make me bullet proof. It simply makes me smart enough to know when to duck. But eventually, I get tired of ducking and instead, I stand square-shouldered facing the onslaught with eyes wide open, my heart gently ticking away in my chest, waiting for what I always knew was inevitable, knowing that it will hit me hard, but defiantly standing there waiting to see exactly how hard it’s going to hit.

    I look at life and envy those that can live in the moment without a concern for the consequences. It must be so comforting being so numb to what may come next. But I can’t help but look at life and see what came before and what will come next without ever allowing myself enough time to savour what is. The present moment continues to elude me. Silence. Now there’s a nice idea!