"It's not nostalgia. I knew it then, like I know it now, that I had something special."
My quote!
I started writing about a dream I had last night, and it turned into this ridiculously long reflective post where stuff came out that I didn't even know or think would come out as I was writing. The journey right, being more important than the end.
Anyway, below is a long winded post about my thoughts and feelings of something from my past. I'm working on sharing, writing and expressing myself more for self development, so I hope no one takes my post the wrong way. Am in a good place in my life, but this brought up all sorts of thoughts and feelings and issues that I guess are still there but I didn't realize it.
Feel free to skip - or read :) Cheers.
I had another weird dream. I think I'm going to start keeping track. It seems to happen when I drink a new tea that day before. Yesterday I tried a new English Breakfast tea that was delish. Last night I had a very bizarre and real feeling dream that sort of stays with you and leaves you emotionally in that dream even after you wake up. It also causes me to reflect and think about stuff. One of those. You can skip these posts if you like :) I'll preface them with "weird dream" or something.
Anyway, this one I'm barely remembering exactly what happened now, but I specifically remember feeling happy and at home. It's like that really belonging and excited to belong feeling. I was in Thailand taking a school bus somewhere and talking to someone, and then walking around the city with its weird buildings and dirty streets, but I remember feeling really at home and so incredibly happy. I woke up upset, because it wasn't real. I tried to go back to sleep into that same dream, but I knew I was awake and couldn't really go back.
This reminded me of my real life. I was in 8th grade the first time I moved to Bangkok, Thailand. My dad was living there as a businessman for his international company, and I was going to move in and live with him for 8th grade and high school. My mom and dad took turns taking care of me, but instead of one weekend here and one week there, I got years between living with both of them, and summers visiting the other one.
Mom had me ages 0-4ish years old. Dad had me 4-7 years old. Mom had me 7-13 years or so, and around then, before 8th grade started, I went to live with my dad where he was, in Bangkok, Thailand.
So anyway, the point was, being in Bangkok, whether it was the place, the time, the people or a combination of all of it, was the first and only time I have ever felt so utterly safe, welcomed, happy and at home. Everything felt perfect, like I really belonged there and everything I knew fell into place in this weird perfect way. I remember being nervous on my first day of school, then as the bus drove into the school, I had this overwhelming sense that everything was going to ok, but not just more than ok, great. It was like the beginning of something great, some spark, some magic in the air and the potential and opportunity were all there.
Everything in my life that year was "right". I was popular and my life was filled with great friends. Family life was good as well and everything fell into this weird feeling of perfect or awesome. I even kept a diary because I knew this was an important time and that it was significant to me.
Then dad got reassigned and we had to move away so 9th grade, freshman year, we lived somewhere else, and Bangkok was this dreamy memory, one year of perfect awesomeness.
The dream and the memory of Bangkok in that one year make me really sad and happy at the same time. I spent a lot of time in high school upset from moving all the time but also of not staying in one place and letting me grow and blossom. I compare it to a new plant, constantly uprooted to a new location and unable to grow any real roots, getting sick and frail. That's how I felt emotionally. Thailand felt like "perfect soil" to me, and then we left and kept moving around and I never fully recovered.
I always wonder, what if I had stayed, how would I have blossomed and grown differently. It was high school after all. I would have definitely been a different person or how much better my life could have turned out. I wonder sometimes if that's why it took me so long to decide on a career or major or why I feel like I fell short, or always second guess certain life choices and decisions. I get restless with furniture, jobs or other things in my life, where I get tired after awhile and feel like I need something new. In Thailand, I never felt like I needed anything new and it was just everything I needed. I think in my mind or my soul I'm always moving trying to get back there to that feeling.
Anyway tangent and a bunch of emotional sharing, but I guess that's what I'm working on with these blogs.
This dream, made me remember what it was like to be in Bangkok my 8th grade year. If someone asked me what my heaven would be like, it would most resemble that one year in Thailand. It was like this complete sphere, this complete world, where everything fit and fell into place, and I fit along with it. It just worked.
I'm not saying my life right now isn't good. I have a lot of great things in my life. In fact, you could easily argue I've had lots of great things in my life since then. You could reflect and argue that that time in my life wasn't actually the best, and that other years actually top it. I could easily reframe my thinking and ideas to dispute my idea.
But I don't know how to express, what it feels like, when everything, absolutely everything in your life feels perfect, really perfect. That's how it was then, at that time, in those moments.
In real life there is a mix of dark and light. I have a lot of great things in my life now, but there are also downsides and struggles somewhere. Honestly, that year in Bangkok had none of those shadows, struggles or incompleteness. It was like everything there was great or a constructive positive experience for me. It almost like I was really meant to be there in that time and place, and my life before then was leading up to that time, and afterwards in some way will always be compared to that time. It was weird and last night's dream reminded me of it.
It's not nostalgia. I knew it then, like I know it now, that I had something special.
I know it's not one of those "looking back I actually didn't appreciate it" moments.I cherished and appreciated every minute while I was in Bangkok that year because I somehow automatically and intuitively knew it was special.
OK enough of that. You'll probably see me revisit and talk about this topic again sometime. The best word for my experience is "perfect" and even that doesn't really convey it properly.
That's the dream I had last night and the feeling I had this morning. It was a reminder of something I had, lost and missed, and still wonder about. It was beautiful, happy and sad. Maybe I have to give up this ghost. Or maybe I should appreciate having that feeling for the time I did. It's this weird positive enigma in my life that I will never fully understand.
I suppose the Buddhist way would be to appreciate it, and let it go, become unattached to the idea or feeling. It's a beautiful anchor though. Alas, we shall see.
No comments:
Post a Comment