3 lines of thought.

Head full of thoughts over the last few days which seem to evaporate as I sit down on purpose to write them out but pop up at the most inconvenient of moments, during the CF just now when we were all supposed to be praying, for example. But shall attempt to jot some of them down very quickly -

1. Ambition or ambitions?

I wonder whether what I pursue now with so much fervour is ambition or my ambitions? Some very bad symptoms - I can't bear to think of being last or of not achieving my goals, the thought of failure doesn't even cross my mind and frightens me so much when it does. There is a perfectionist streak in me that seems to always strive to be the first and is afraid of being left behind. There is so much pride in me, that I think I am better than everyone else. When I wrote those innocent goals and ambitions down in my diary, I never dreamed that they might someday become so big and all-consuming. And now I am afraid to let them go, and acknowledge my weakness and inability to reach them without His help.

And yet, that's all that I can do right now, for the situation alternates between being hopeless and ... hopeless. A very happy and foolish break I took last weekend has its price now, and I must pay for it with late nights and perseverance. And acknowledging that this situation is teaching me so much more of my own inadequecies and inabilities, and learning to accept that there are many things I am incapable of doing (such as going without sleep, such as thinking fast, such as skimming through papers and comprehending them). Knowing that I can do only so much and the rest is up to Him -

And realising that there are many people better than me in every way and every person better than me in some way. Learning humbly from the people around me - from the way they balance their relationships, from the way they treat their work - I am very wowed and very thankful to have met these people before going back to Singapore. I am very awed with the way people keep going and soar high despite their personal circumstances and problems (much, much huger than my own) and, many of them, without God. I am awed by the way I see people care for each other, beyond emotion to practicality.

I am thankful that God chooses the weak, cos without that, where would I be?

Ambition threatens to possess me sometimes, and if He doesn't deal with it now, it's going to bug me in my future. I will always be thinking (as I sometimes do now) what would have happened if I had done this or that, if I had just submitted that form a little earlier, would life have been different for me? I will always be looking for something brighter and something higher for my own glory and will be chasing after things I may not really want to do just for the prestige - I might do things excellently not for the joy of it but because of the stress of it; and look back at my life having nothing to show for it but a relentless pursuing of tomorrow.

So please remind me that there are no ifs or buts in Your will, and it is totally for Your glory. I always do things that are so ridiculous and grieve You - but just use my life now to bring You glory.

I remember that before my exams in the last semester I said that I wasn't working for perfect grades but I was working towards perfect effort, and whatever the grades God gave me I would not be bothered but I would thank Him, because I would still have known that I'd done my best. It wasn't easy to say it then, and I am still unable to say it right now for my project, but I know that within the next two weeks He will take me to that point as He always does.

2. Perseverance

I read this quote a few days ago while flipping through a birthday present of collated quotes.

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘press on’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.” - Calvin Coolidge

How true that is. I'm thankful for gifts and talents and especially how very much I have been blessed to have parents who have tried to urge me to use and develop them, I am thankful that God has given them to me but it's so true that nothing gets you anywhere but perseverance. And that's what I'm learning with this project, that little by little I'm getting slightly closer to the end than I was before, that I can't give up midway, that I have to keep at it, keep at it, and press on, that even though I have to read three papers to write a sentence, I can't give up!

Abraham Lincoln, an amazing man and role model, and another American president, said, "I'm a slow walker, but I never walk back!" And to that I add, "or look back..." And so it is that way, with my project and with my life - I resolve not to walk back!

3. Role models

Speaking of role models, Albert Einstein is a great one for perseverance. Everyone knows the famous saying about genius being 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. But this wise and very adorable man also said,

"I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times, the conclusion is wrong. But the 100th time, I am right!"

"It's not that I'm so smart, I just stay with problems longer."

"There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."

What a guy!

Another person I came across in the news recently was Daw Aung San Suu Kyi - her sentence had been extended recently for another year. Stumbling upon snippets of information here and there and piecing together her life, I couldn't help being touched and humbled at the same time thinking about my own. The daughter of a Myanmese hero assassinated when she was two, she'd gone to Oxford, married and settled in England, and was whisked back to Myanmar through an unforeseen precipitation of events to be caught up in the democratic movement in Myanmar.

I kept looking for pictures of her online and seeing her spirit, courage, determination shining out through her eyes. She was and is beautiful, but what sets her apart is much much more than her beauty; it's just her amazing tenacity and her willingness to keep at it for however long it takes and however much it costs for the good of her people.

U2's "Walk on" was written for her and the story goes that she was out with her party giving speeches and gathering supporters, and the militia pointed their guns at her and threatened to shoot if she didn't stop. But she continued walking -

what an indomitable spirit and what an example - there is something more in life than what is bogging me down now and the endless pointless ambition. It all boils down again to success vs significance, and I hope that every day brings me a little closer to what I know I must eventually choose.