Tag: companionship

  • Cherished to death

    Cherished to death

    When love is a well kept secret, it becomes torturous

    When love is embraced, it emits a glow that keeps the darkness of the world at bay

    When we withhold our love from fear of it not being enough, we destroy the very object of our affection

    Thus, self deprecation cherishes beauty in silence, but leaves to whither and die, the object of its cherishing

    It is the doubts we harbour of our adequacy, that undermines our resolve to be beautiful

    In our efforts to hide from the world our fear, we lose sight of those who see in us what we don’t see in ourselves

    Those same souls who worship our beauty, but are discarded through our fear, are the souls whose hearts we cherish…silently

    Our belief that they do not need our embrace as much as we wish they would embrace us, is what leaves them cherished, but discarded

    Even the most cherished of hearts, if left without a home, will die of exposure.

    Perhaps this is why the good fades from our lives, as we hold on to the bad that we believe is not fair to place as a burden on others…

  • A Brain Dump

    A Brain Dump

    The short posts don’t allow for a meaningful purge of what rumbles inside my head. And there’s a lot of rumbling this morning. Having finally published my novel, the reactions I’ve noted along with the assumptions that people make about my reasons for doing so, are entertaining. I’ve always taken a morbid pleasure from watching people sum me up incorrectly, or assume to know what drives me. I barely know myself, so it’s highly improbable that anyone else will know either.

    Despite my efforts at explaining myself, sharing my passion, living out loud, and scribbling my thoughts in digital ink for any passerby to read, I still remain a well-kept secret. A colourful life such as mine is intimidating for many to grasp. It’s much easier for them to find random points of entertainment instead. Of that, there is an unlimited supply.

    However, it only serves to be morbidly entertaining if the ones who are peering in have no significance in my life. What then when one held dear takes a closer look and feels afraid? Those are the moments when the introspection shifts from morbid curiosity to flirting with regret. Being trusting has earned me more struggles than deliberate betrayals ever did.

    When philosophy teases us, we play with words that talk of the strength of character of those most burdened by the trials of life, but when reality demands that we embrace them, we recede from fear of contamination. Sometimes, we recede from fear of feeling burdened by them. But from afar, from a safe distance, we admire and celebrate their resilience, as long as they keep their resilience to themselves.

    The irony of society is that it will be more inclined to offer itself to one who appears untarnished so that it may experience the process of being tarnished by the experiences of life with them, rather than to revel in the joy of one who has already been polished by what once tarnished them. It’s the equivalent of wanting to marry a virgin, but hoping to have the sexual experience of a seasoned whore, and then realising that the whore may be more pleasurable, but looking for one who is still virginal in demeanour. We really are an entertaining bunch, aren’t we?

    Sometimes it seems like we’re hypocritical in our approach to establishing or respecting respectable standards, but that hypocrisy is easily defended when such standards become our own to defend. Fear of the future has tainted many well-meaning men, and suspicion has destroyed many loves before they were allowed to bloom.

    Words have been elusive, except in unpredictable bursts of late. The topics have been revealing, teasing my soul and flirting with my audience, but largely unfulfilled either way. Fulfilment continues to be a slithery one. Testing everything that I assumed to be true, and teasing it with new experiences and emotions that have long been dismissed as taunts of fairy tales.

    Poetry has been a bipolar friend. Sometimes testing my skill at articulating the melody of my mindlessness, and at other times distorting my words to reflect the angst that defines my madness. Between mindlessness and madness, love is cradled in a delicate hammock, ready to tip over at the slightest sway, but even in its tipping over, offering laughter and joy in unexpected waves of delight that distract me from the sand in my face.

    The ambivalence of life digs ever deeper. Joys grow more intense with each ravaging of happiness that passes, only to be followed by yet another crescendo of joy. Each time, the crescendo exceeds the previous pitch, creating an ever-deepening cavern into which to plunge when the joy is tainted. From depths of despair to wings of angels, peace is elusive. But peace fades from want in the presence of such joy. If only the joy would stay, perhaps then it will inspire a peaceful serenade of a life waiting to be indulged in hues yet to be seen.

    An interesting life leaves a kaleidoscope of scars that form beautiful patterns in the stars, as we imagine constellations of soulful connections in spaces that remain empty and lifeless, if not for the gaze of the beloved into that realm. My vocabulary fails me much. Yet another double-edged dagger, fulfilling my need to articulate more closely what my heart yearns for, yet denying me attachment due to my increasingly complex expression in my efforts to be understood. Finding the most articulate words to describe in the smallest phrases has birthed the epitome of sophistication through minimalism. Only such sophistication serves no good end in the absence of one who seeks to understand, or heaven forbid, to embrace.

    A dump indeed, this has been…but not of the brain, and more of the heart. A strange encounter.

  • To be loved…

    To be loved…

    Love, without understanding, is mere infatuation.

    To love, is to see the strength that created such beauty, not just to admire the beauty.

    To love, is to caress the scar with a gentleness that honours the pain that caused it.

    To love, is to see the pain that sometimes distorts the beauty, without devaluing the beauty.

    To love, is to see, before needing to be seen.

    The profession of love, without truly knowing who is being loved, is a profession of need, more than it is an embrace.

    It is when our need to be understood by our beloved exceeds our desire to understand them first that love makes a silent exit, and entitlement replaces it.

    To truly love, you must first seek to understand, because understanding demands that you pay attention to your beloved, before you feel a need to demand their attention for what you need instead.

    Be loved. Be blessed.

  • To be loved…truly

    To be loved…truly

    Three things that make us whole…

    To be seen… Beyond the facade. To have the essence of who we are, known to those we trust and hold dear.

    To be heard… Not only when we cry out, but also when we speak gently of the troubles in our heart.

    To be loved… For more than how we make others feel, but to be loved for what we need in return, without having to claim it.

    In that order, because a voice without an identity is not a voice. It’s only a whisper in the wind.

    A face without a voice is only window dressing, or a trophy. And not a complete being.

    And love… Love without a reciprocal embrace…an embrace of what we hold within, as well as what we willingly give, is an empty love that taints towards bitterness, rather than beauty.

    Love beyond lust or infatuation is rare. True love is never abandoned.

    I see you. I hear you. I love you. Three of the most valuable gifts you could ever give. But, you cannot give what you don’t have. For this reason, you must first see, hear, and love who you are, before you will be able to share it with another.

  • Save yourself from regrets

    Save yourself from regrets

    I believe that among the great deathbed regrets will be the realisation that we never truly showed the world who we are.

    It’s the what-ifs and if-onlys that cause more regret and heartache than any bad decision.

    Bad decisions are made with good intentions, yet we always choose to remember the negative outcome, rather than celebrate our innocence and sincerity for trying.

    We do this because we’re more focused on what others think of us, than we are about what we know to be true about ourselves.

    This bias against ourselves is one of the roots with which ingratitude takes hold in our life.

    When that happens, we become martyrs in our own mind, as we focus on everything that didn’t work out, while losing sight of the beauty and blessings that we have.

    Living up to your convictions, despite society, is what will provide you with peace and fulfilment when you need it most.

    That is, in those final moments when you look back at the sum total of your life and wonder if you made the best of it, or did you only focus on the worst of it?

    Redefine what peace means to you. It is always beyond just the absence of disagreement or hostility. Peace lies in being true to yourself, and appreciating the opportunities for growth that such conviction creates in those around you.



  • Only you

    Only you

    “I’ve been incompatible with anyone else since I met you.”

    Sometimes, without warning, someone enters your life and challenges every assumption you ever made about what’s possible.

    What you thought you deserved was limited to what you were capable of achieving up to that point, and maybe just a quiet desire to acquire some peace beyond it.

    Until they see in you what you thought was your own delusions, and you see in them what you thought were only your dreams.

    Once you connect with that truth, nothing can convince you that anything less is what you must settle for.

    Settling becomes a vulgar thought, and fulfilment becomes incomplete without them.

    When that happens, the distance between love and torture grows, and you find yourself stretched between the two, with only shards of sanity to prevent you from being torn apart.

    Those shards will tear at your dreams and taunt your delusions until their embrace is secured.

    Until then, life becomes a dyslexic dance with insanity, and love remains elusive.


  • For the love of peace

    For the love of peace

    The night is only as peaceful as the day’s indulgence, and the day’s indulgence is only as focused as the reflections of the night.

    What we court in quiet moments reflects our beliefs, but what we pursue in our efforts with others reflects our convictions.

    When the two are aligned, sleep becomes a spiritual experience, and love…love becomes a way of life.

    When the two are in conflict, life becomes torturous, and love…love becomes our enemy.


  • Expecting hope

    Expecting hope

    Expectations are simply hopes with a sense of entitlement.

    The reason for our entitlement to the fulfilment of our hopes are many. Most often, they’re based on what we contributed towards others.

    Sometimes we want that contribution reciprocated because we don’t want to allow others to treat us unfairly, or to take us for granted.

    But sometimes, we hold on to that entitlement because we want the treasures of who we are to be handled with love and gentleness by a specific other.

    Both are based on the hope of what the outcome offers us in happiness and fulfilment. Or even just in achieving a sense of significance.

    Unfortunately, if expectations are not mutually honoured, it becomes a burden for one, and a prison for the other.

    The good news is, both are choices. The burden and the prison. But they weigh us down until we recognise that they’re choices.

    More importantly, until we are willing to let go of the choice to hold on after we’ve exhausted all efforts to achieve its fulfilment, it will continue to feel like a burden or a prison that is imposed, and not one that is chosen.

    Choose wisely…choose consciously.