Tag: loneliness

  • That empty bench…

    That empty bench…

    The saddest scene for me has always been the abandoned park bench.

    It echoes with profound intensity the pervasive isolation that too many experience, but too few reveal.

    There is a shame that is carried upon the broken wings of abandonment that anchors us in that space between wanting to create beauty in this world, while believing that it will always be unreachable for ourselves.

    So we birth the martyr within, presenting it as the selfless lover without.

    Being sure to distract others with affection, so that no one notices how achingly we stare at those empty benches.

    Those benches that once bore the hopes and dreams of togetherness.

    Those benches that once were claimed as sacred spaces.

    Those benches that remain available to the next loving embrace between its arms, knowing that once the lovers move on, it will remain, rooted to that spot, waiting to be embraced and abandoned, again.

    Photo credit : Adobe Stock


  • Elusive peace…

    Elusive peace…

    Peace…that elusive mist that needs to enshroud everything.

    Its absence creates the need to change the circumstances of our lives, so that we leave no space for nothing, needing every space to be filled with something.

    Some look to fill those spaces with trinkets and tokens.

    Others look to fill it with purposeful endeavours.

    But central to both, lies the need to benefit someone in our efforts to avoid being no one.

    Without that someone, we remain unfulfilled and incomplete.

    Similar to the nothingness in the absence of peace.

    Because life must be lived, and living must leave a legacy.

    But a legacy ceases to be a legacy if it has no inheritors at the moment of our passing.

    This primal instinct to be something is what drives our efforts towards avoiding being nothing.

    The threat of which is the root to losing ourselves to the distraction of everything, when we lose hope of ever being something…to someone…but not just anyone.

    Thus, the test of gratitude enters, as we reject some in our pursuit of others, never knowing for certain the impact we have on the lives that we touch.

    Photo credit : Adobe Stock


  • A walk…and a bit

    A walk…and a bit

    I stepped on the treadmill today. It’s not my favourite pastime, but I did it anyway. At first, I recalled the time, many years ago, when I first attempted it and found myself winded in less than 3 minutes. I was still working in corporate. Life was lifeless, and purpose was found in servitude.

    I travelled a lot since then. Mostly business travel. Staring down at the footplate of the treadmill, I found myself walking those streets again. The back roads of Nice, a short throw from the plush touristy area, the plaster was flaking off the walls of the apartment buildings, and the empty plots were unkempt and overgrown with weeds.

    Then the cramped sidewalks of London, with its scarcity of smiles and less warmth to offer than its weather. I walked quietly through the neighbourhoods, distant from the bustling centre of wealth, and saw hints of warm homes and affectionately adorned window sills. The cold mist reminded me of my estranged nature in such scenes.

    The quiet, unnatural streets of Jubail crept into view next, with fallen, premature dates melted and smeared into the sidewalk, and the mocking smiles from the police officers revealing their revolting oral hygiene. The thick air, laden with humidity and a scorching breeze choking me up as the treadmill continued its whine as I journeyed my way to the next city.

    Tunis, with a touch of warmth, an uncanny sense of safety, and humility in large doses, prompted a hint of a smile as I recalled strange encounters with strange people. The trip on the metro passing Mandela’s stop, and the beautiful voices of the children singing their songs in Arabic each morning as I waited for the train to arrive. Probably the only wistful recollection of my time there.

    The walk to China Town in Singapore, or to the Indian quarters, clinically clean and oddly cold. Buddhist temples and expensive shopping malls crowding all the open spaces, and cliques of old folks line dancing in the parks without a hint of interest in the rhythm to which they danced. Everything so detached and robotic, as if celebrating the privilege but disconnected from the experience.

    And of course, traipsing the steps and the hills and tunnels of Monaco. Walking the length and course of the grand prix circuit, delighting myself like a little child as I recognised the bends and the straights from my hours on the PlayStation. But just as soon, the delight would fade to a subdued smile, and then nothing. Just a sigh.

    You’re never lonely if you like the one you’re alone with, or so they say. So they say. An hour later, still barely exhausted from the spirited walk through my daydreams, duty interrupted my moments in foreign cities, each echoing the solitary nature of my life, and the isolation of my spirit. The photos and stories shared with others later on never compensated for the absence of one to share it with.

    But, peace comes slowly and silently when we learn to embrace the inevitability of our lives, rather than yearning for what never was despite our best efforts. The sweat pouring down my face stung my eyes a little more than the subdued tears, as I realised the futility of tears that are left to dry on their own.

    It was a long walk on that treadmill today. But there are still many streets to explore in stillness and isolation. Wanderlust has departed, and in its place it left a quiet composure of knowing that nothing more should be expected of what lies ahead. The weariness is finding its home in the same alcoves that were just recently filled with more. But it is an alcove and not a treasure chest. What visited briefly never intended to stay.

    Thus, expectations are recalibrated, and life…life remains a stranger that prefers the company of others. Exhale.

  • Restless souls write

    Restless souls write

    Restless souls write

    Anxious souls read

    Complacent souls pay no heed

    And then there’s me. Fitting uncomfortably in each space, while not fitting in at all.

    There’s a blessing in being anomalous. It spares us the slavery of living by rules.

    But blessings don’t occur without burdens, and the burden of being anomalous is the restlessness that it spawns.

    As we look around for familiarity, but only find much to scorn, we see the drudgery of the complacent and the fear of the anxious.

    And in that is born our restlessness that stirs us from our sleep.

    Once you’ve tasted the sweetness of living, existing feels like a curse. And once you’ve tasted the beauty of love, its absence feels like…nothing…it feels like nothing at all.


  • 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.

  • The Lonely Path

    The Lonely Path

    There is comfort in being in a space unoccupied by others. The plague of clichés and the clutter of egos take up residence in crowded spaces. Blending into the crowd always threatened my sanity. Living up to an expectation set against a standard that I don’t subscribe to will always result in disappointment for the one that holds such expectation. Sadly, the fulfilment of our expectations defines the sense of significance for too many.

    A simple but defining realisation dawned on me in recent months. There is a conflict of sentiment in encouraging others to own their life. To pursue a path that is unique to what they yearn to see realised in this world places a burden on their shoulders that most are unwilling to bear. It’s much easier to talk about the change that is needed but to recede from the battlefield when the time to act arrives is even easier. Leading the charge against complacency is never a popular role to take.

    Spectators are the armchair critics of life. The back seat drivers, or the wall flowers. They observe the most, analyse the most, criticise the most, and do the least. But their time spent gathering information about everything that is wrong positions them well to be the first to point out the shortcomings of those that choose to go to battle. Through nothing more than the momentum contained in their numbers, they become the opinion makers and the advisors, much like the politicians that send everyone else’s children to fight wars that are created around boardroom tables.

    The odds are stacked against the ones that set out to make things better. Gaining critical mass for positive change amongst a mass of critics is beyond daunting. It requires a healthy dose of tenacity, resilience, and a dollop of manipulation. The populist leader however chooses to have a healthy dose of manipulation and nothing more. Offer incremental change and deliver only a fraction of it, and the history books will celebrate you for generations to come. All you need to do is give people reason to believe that they were part of a movement that made them feel better about not making progress in life, and then release them to go back into the dreary cycle of their lives.

    It’s easy to see why the path of leadership, authentic leadership is a lonely one, especially when you consider that leading does not require a vocal following. It doesn’t even require a conscious one. I once heard that the definition of leadership is to do more than is expected of you. This makes so many sincere contributors leaders despite them feeling like nothing more than burden-bearers.

    Step up to take up the slack of the slackers and automatically you take a lead role. Fill the parenting void of absent parents and you become a role model. Assume responsibility for an outcome that everyone needs but no one wishes to own, and you become a rebel. Speak out loud what you know everyone else is thinking but would never utter from fear of inheriting responsibility, and you become the abrasive protestor. The fly in the ointment, or the pain in the butt. Good intention makes no difference. The moment you choose to improve the quality of your life or the life of those around you, prepare to be judged because in stepping up, we automatically make visible those that are sitting down.

    It’s that easy to start out on the lonely path of leadership. Not pseudo-leadership that needs a title or a declaration to be established. True leadership. The one inspired by the struggle of the common man, or the aspiration of the unknown dreamer. That is the lonely path, because if everyone recognised the importance of the change that is needed, change would not be needed. Natural progression would happen without disruption. The human condition would improve as a natural consequence of commonly-held values that are actually valued. But they don’t value the values that they profess to uphold. Unless they are the designated leader, it’s not their job to care.

    So it rests on the shoulders of the restless ones among us. The ones that see the value of progress and can’t rest until it is realised. The ones that see the gaps and fill it with contributions that uplift the weary souls, or the under resourced. The ones who act, in spite of the critics and the knowledge that they will likely be damned before they are appreciated, let alone celebrated. They are the ones on that lonely path. Despite this, they are also the ones that are most likely to stop and offer a hand to the one whose lethargy finally saw them fall foul of the same system that they once coveted.

    Companionship is rare on this path. By implication of their nature, compensating for the selfish embrace of the other is simply a matter of course. Realising that your restlessness is likely to threaten rather than attract the ones that it is intended to uplift, living a life of restrained expression becomes second nature. The smile that never reaches the eyes, or the embrace that feels comforting but is rarely reciprocated are easily overlooked in the haste that accompanies the indulgence of the distracted.

    [This is an incomplete thought process…]

  • The Space Between

    The Space Between

    The hole in your heart can only be filled by the companion that knows that it is there. Sometimes we seek companionship in search of one that recognises that gap, but fail to realise that we in fact projected our need on their abilities instead. We flit between the calm and the clutter, the spaces of quiet, and the spaces of revelry and indulgence, sometimes being pulled towards the calm, but most often pulled towards the clutter.

    The clutter holds the promise of accompaniment, which deceptively veils itself with a mask of companionship. A kindred spirit is seen in common needs, more than in common goals. In those needs that resonate between two souls, familiarity is born. Familiarity, especially when it echoes similar pains and wants, creates an electricity that roots us to a point of temporary relief that lacks fulfilment. But that hint of relief, of a longer term repose, draws us in, and we find ourselves willingly sliding down that slope of abdication.

    Impervious to the effects of our inclinations, the taunt of the clutter that promises the calm draws out our demons, and subdues our virtues. Relief morphs into indulgence, and indulgence honours the need for significance. To feel worthy of more than we’ve been able to acquire, companionship drifts into the distance, and the vacuous space that elicits nothing but instant gratification beckons.

    The point of departure on that journey has to be grounded in faith if ever we are to find a rope on which to hold, as we cling to sanity. Sanity is quickly reduced to a concept of common relativity, while understanding is all that matters. As long as we feel understood, the principles by which we act, or the moral compass that once guided us loses relevance. After all, life is about priorities, and priorities are applied to needs. The greater the need, the more energy and hope we expend in its pursuit.

    There is an abundance of similarly troubled souls. The ones looking for companionship that holds that embrace. The embrace that completes the flimsy grip we have on life, in the absence of which a future state is all that we court, and the present moment becomes nothing more than a means to an end. An end that no one else can relate to. An end that rests only in our hearts, and is seen only by the one in whose hands rests our soul.

    But the clutter distracts and the indulgence beckons when faith waivers. Needs are tethered to the physical form, while peace is not. The physical form demands fulfilment, while the soul demands peace, but as long as we’re living, existing in a physical world, indulgence will always command our attention, and peace will always be elusive, except for those fleeting moments in the beginning. The very beginning of every embrace of a kindred spirit completes us in a moment of deceptive bliss. Sometimes we’re distracted by the clutter in that moment, and while we enjoy that moment intensely, we forget to see it for what it is. And so it is lost, along with the peace, as we draw on the indulgence that feeds our physical state, while the peace is shooed away.

    There is a delicate space between the peace and the clutter. So delicate that the slightest distraction breaks the thread that tethers us to it, causing us to drift aimlessly. Well, not entirely aimlessly. As we drift, our focus again shifts away from the peace, the calm, the tranquil, and instead, we go in search of that fleeting moment that is only ever felt in the most momentary seconds of the initial embrace. And the rest of our lives are spent in pursuit of recreating that one single moment that we experienced when we least expected it, and when we didn’t even realise it was presenting itself.

    The slope steepens as we drift away from it, and our burdens lighten as we see hints of it approaching. It’s a to and fro of warm bodies looking for a spark to create something greater than their individual selves, but find themselves lost in the rift between here and somewhere else.

    The hole in your heart can only ever be filled by the one in whose hands rests your soul. Everything else is a distraction, or a stay of execution. The more calm we experience, the closer we are drawn to the sublime. The more clutter, the more ghastly is the silence that visits our soul.

    [I once wrote without concern for the audience, or even for any concern of the rationality of my thoughts. I wrote because it was a momentary breath that filled my lungs beyond the needs. It’s been a while since I’ve felt my lungs fill with the air that once elated me. Now I write in search of those moments that were created when the distractions were what I described, rather than what I sought to embellish.]

  • Every time a man (myself) gives way to vanity, every time he thinks and lives in order to show off, this is a betrayal. Every time, it has always been the great misfortune of wanting to show off which has lessened me in the presence of the truth. We do not need to reveal ourselves to others, but only to those we love. For then we are no longer revealing ourselves in order to seem but in order to give. There is much more strength in a man who reveals himself only when it is necessary.

    I have suffered from being alone, but because I have been able to keep my secret I have overcome the suffering of loneliness. To go right to the end implies knowing how to keep one’s secret. And, today, there is no greater joy than to live alone and unknown.

    Albert Camus, Notebooks 1935-1942 (via misanthropyaddict)