Who are you? Do you know?

Have you ever seen, met or heard about someone you once knew and wondered who are they now? With these things called Facebook, High5, Friendster & etc etc... I'm suddenly confronted with pictures of people who I can't even remember if I knew them =p

Some profiles I see and wonder, what and who is this person now? Knew them once upon a time...but how about now? Aside from the obvious job title or whether the person is married or single, I wonder WHO aRE they...what have they been doing... how much has changed in their lives? I'm sure some have seen my profile and wondered the same "Whatever happened to Chan Mei Fung..wow, she's gotten fat...OMG she's going out with an Indian..." and I can only wonder what else people say =p

There's always the ones that have "new names" and only upon closer inspection does it dawn upon you its a person you once knew as some chinese name. Or there are some that have changed so much in outward appearance that you wonder if you've got the right person.... those that become swans...become very thin, or very fat, or very pretty or glamorous... and of course those that've moved far far away...

I'm mostly in awe or wonder of those that have gotten married and have a few kids in tow. Its a whole "cannot connect" in my system. Hahaha.... Once again, please i'm not saying getting married is bad, its a wonderful thing. I'm thinking more like, how????? How do you decide at 18, 20, 22 that you're ready to make a commitment for life, that you're ready to bring life into this world. Into a world that at 22 you might not understand that well yourself.

At 29 I'm still discovering myself, and my thoughts, my views and everything around me... the world, politics, people, culture, personalities, God, principles..etc... and of course what I want in my life. What legacy do I want to leave behind? I can't imagine committing myself with someone for the rest of my life and bringing new life into this world without first knowing or having my own actual standing or principle in life and etc. Only now am I actually discovering being totally "independent" of my family or parents. I used to think that I really was independent. I paid my own way for everything since 18 and I have a steady career. I made all my own decisions, no 'curfew', no answering to anyone abt things that i do and etc etc. BUT no matter what I was still living under my parents' roof. Somehow there was still an umbrella of 'family' that would take care of where we lived and if the TV at home breaks down, someone (i.e. my dad) would fix it (btw, my tv has broken down, so if by the off chance, pa, if u're reading this, could u fix it??). Or if i wanted to invite a group of friends over just to lepak, I had to tell my parents to be 'scarce'. Don't get me wrong I had my freedom, but there were boundaries which I subconsciously kept to because it was still my parent's home and there were so many things I really didn't need to think of.

Now, I'm finally out of that invisible boundary. And this makes me have all the freedom to decide on what I want to do, how I want to do it and etc. And its exhilarating. Any decision I make is my own. I don't have to pass it by anyone if I didn't want to. And having this platform, is an "eye-opener" because this is where you choose who you want to be, who you are, what defines you. Not what other people (i.e. your parents, your bf, your husband, your children) want, but what you want in YOUR life. You make the decisions, and you reap the repercussions, whether good or bad.

So now that I'm here, where I am... I'm beginning to be who I'm suppose to be... and to me, only now i can really make the decisions that 'make me' who I am. So back to, how does one make all those life defining choices when you're so young and bright eyed? Is it no wonder that so many marriages fail now? I'm sure there are those that succeed... but who are we kidding, look at the divorce rate now. However most of us lead the normal life of a 20++++ (notice how many ++ there were) wondering what is it all for blah blah blah... what's the meaning of life, what am I here for... and all end up doing the same old same old usual stuff like study, get a degree, get a job, get a car, get bf/gf, get married, move out, have kids blah blah blah ... its like auto-pilot ....its just only a matter of when we do it... some choose to do it young and way before being able to even establish in themselves 'who i am' . So why?? I believe some (and of course myself included ...sometimes) just go with the flow... not really thinking or putting any effort or thought into the why and what it all means... so, can we really know who we are if we just follow the flow?? I seriously doubt it... If you don't break the waves, how can you have your own directions and make your own waves?

So here I am now, at 2.30am, awake and wondering, "who am I'? - oh, but dun get me wrong, I'm not in those depressing moods of what am i doing here, what am i doing with my life, etc etc Actually, I'm in a good place right now. I believe up to now my life has been absolutely blessed by God. True that things of course don't always go my way - that's not a blessed life, that's just a spoilt life if everything went my way-. I think I'm really blessed because I have been given the chances, the ability, and the freedom to choose who I want to be; to make the choices that 'make me'. Some wonderful 'quotes' I came upon quite some time back sums it all up really well...

"And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years." -Abraham Lincoln

"To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all" - Oscar Wilde

I think that to just 'exist' and just 'go with the flow' would be just sad. I'm pretty sure that God didn't put us here just to 'exist'.