Always be thankful (Formal Blog)

Remember me sharing with you about our weekly runs? Well, we just had our cross-country run on Wednesday.

True, I was exhausted and tired out by the run. But that’s not the main point of my blog post. True, we are going to be getting LEAP points from the run. But again, I’m not going to revolve my blog post around my excitement about how the run is going to help in building my portfolio for JC. Instead I’m going to talk about how the run applies to us in our lives.

Let’s split the run up into three stages: the start, the journey and the end. I’ll use a year of schooling as an example, but I believe this can still be applied no matter what you use.

The start, is the part which everyone, or rather, most people would have enjoyed. Everyone was bursting with energy and zest. It wasn’t surprising to see many people person sprinting forward with strength and energy that did not seem to falter. Let’s link this to the start of a schooling year. We are usually excited to be back at school and back with our friends. There isn’t any homework yet so we are all quite relaxed. Apart from getting up early, the days past by effortlessly.

The journey, is the part where things started getting a bit tougher. It seemed like a “sooner or later you get tired” situation, where many people stopped running and started walking. Sounds like us? Definitely. This is the part where the homework, tests and stress start to hit. “Life’s tough” or “I hate school” are common phrases used. The run doesn’t seem that fun now. We just want to give up and take the easy way out. Suddenly, life isn’t fun anymore. In fact, the days pass by so slowly it hurts.

The end, is the part, which I felt was the most difficult part of the run. My energy had been drained off almost completely. Almost everyone was walking. There was a strong temptation to stop running and just walk to the finish line. The end actually very much represents our end of year exams. This computer game is suddenly so attractive and addictive. That book suddenly engages us so much we can't put it down. Are we disciplined enough to do our work, or do we give into temptations which only provide temporary satisfaction and joy. Despite the temptations, I persevered and made it to the finish line, full of fatigue, but proud of my efforts.

Do we take on life with this attitude? Do we persevere on when we are facing problems, or do we decide on taking the easy way out and giving up? Everyone faces temptations. Everyone will feel tired after being exposed to some form of continuous activity which in this case, can be either running or studying. But it’s how you tackle these problems, that is the significant and important part. The choice is ours to make. What do you choose? I choose to press on. I choose to persevere. I choose not to give in to temptation when it strikes me. I choose to be victorious.

I returned to school, stomach still churning away at the heaps of goodies consumed just a day or two before, tired and bleary eyed, but resigned. What I had been looking forward to for an antagonising one month(or two), had ended abruptly in five days.

Yes, you got that right. I am talking about the Chinese New Year break. Though I must admit that I enjoyed this year's celebrations, I felt that five days just wasn't enough, taking visitations and homework into consideration. Why?

Day 1(Friday): - Morning was whiled away in school for new year celebrations, no work done.
Day 2(Reunion Dinner): - Occupied with entertaining guests(which I enjoyed), one piece of work done.
Day 3(Visiting of relatives, Reunion Dinner): - Out the whole day, no work done.
Day 4(Karaoke at night with mum's family): - Out only in night, second piece of work done.
Day 5(NIL): - Out only in night for dinner, last piece of work done.

Looking at my timetable for a second time, I realise that I am actually quite privileged to have had such a relaxing Chinese New Year. And it's wrong to say the Chinese New Year break was too short. I think without "Chinese New Year", the sentence would still make sense. This being taken into consideration, I realised we as humans, are never satisfied.

Before the end-of-year examinations, everything seems so interesting. You're constantly tempted, for example, wanting to read a storybook instead of revising, or playing a computer game and trying to ascend to the next level. When the end-of-year examinations are over, the book which had seemed so irresistible initially is reduced to dust in less than a week; the computer game suddenly becomes boring and is unable to engage you like it did before. Soon, we are complaining that the holidays are too boring, and are dying to return to school. The first week of school starts well, but when the homework starts to flood in, we start complaining once again, that life is tough and cherish every single holiday we have. Then the end-of-year exams arrive, and the whole cycle starts again.

It's wrong to say that I've gotten the post-chinese-new-year blues. If you would rather, I think "post holiday blues" is a more suitable term. Let's pray I will be satisfied.