never was

friends have always called me a carefree girl. i seem to have no stress, never feel depressed, rarely get dragged or bogged down by the doom and gloom of the world. i thought so too. but today, as i sit and scroll through the national and world news, i wonder.

how does one maintain a certain joie-de-vivre (yeah, my tagline) when the world is literally going to hell? in the past two months alone, i've witnessed deathly accidents and heard of personal accounts of muggings, robberies and attacks more than i've ever had in my life. and it's not just national. the world news is not any more uplifting. life is truly not getting any better is it?

i was saying to a friend how we used to have 5-year plans, or a 10-year plan. but now, i bet no one speaks of that anymore. we don't even know where we'll be 5 months from now, let alone 5 years.

perhaps we could retreat and go into denial. go about life as if nothing is happening, not caring about what IS happening and just pretend that all that matters is me, myself and i.

or maybe as a friend pointed out, we can just jump off a building since everyone seems to think that ending their life is the only option. the 'pick and jump' syndrome. is it really the solution?

pessimistic is not me, but my heart breaks for those who think that there's no other way. i have what i call the 'elder sister syndrome'. i'm the eldest daughter, with a younger brother and sister. from young, dad and mum taught me to be independant, responsible, thorough and dutiful. until now, i'm what my sister calls a neat-freak. i make sure everything is done. i worry about everyone in the family until i see and know they're safe (daily!). i arrange things and events so that they'll work out nicely (in my own opinion). i organize. i plan. i fret. i fuss. everything has to align. everything has to be perfect.

yes, to have a sense of responsibility is good but thank god that honestly, in life, we don't have to shoulder everything. learning to let go was the best thing i've ever learned. one of the most liberating lessons.

not everyone thinks alike. not everyone wants the same thing.

at times, i wondered if my newly acquired point of view would cause me to be perceived as a really really naive person. how silly is she? how naive and innocent? doesn't she know that she'll be taken advantage of? teased? perhaps. but does it matter? who does it hurt? i think, at the end of the day, if what was done was done with a pure conscience and with the utmost love, then that's what counts.

life would be happier.
life would be better.
if we just let go and not take the world upon our shoulders
that was never meant to be our responsibility.

our families, our friends, loved ones, our future, life .... yes we care but it was never our responsibility, never our 'charge'

trust and just live. LIVE
isn't that a better life?