Strange Roads
Wednesday, June 08, 2011 @ 6:35 PM | 0 comment(s)

“If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can’t know better until knowing better is useless.”
– Miles Halter, “Looking For Alaska” by John Green

They say life is an existing time that doesn’t have any guarantee to when it would end. It is a journey in the never-ending road of challenges and discovering one’s self. It is about accepting truths and ignoring lies. To others it may be about living the dream, fantasies, unicorns and little kittens, or maybe endless responsibilities and struggles for perfection. It can be about taking risks, grabbing opportunities, learning and growing. It is about committing mistakes and facing its consequences.

We all make mistakes, because we are all given chances to make our own choices. And not all of these choices are the best. We may be too stubborn to even acknowledge that we indeed made the wrong decision… but deep inside, we all know that we were incorrect. Mistakes may come in different forms. We may have a blunder when it comes to choosing the perfect dress or shoes for our first date, or choosing gum flavors in the gum store. They can be as little as those… and can be so big that it may affect our entire future, like choosing the right major to take, or choosing that guy over the other one. We make choices every day, and we also make mistakes every day.

All of us are afraid of committing mistakes. We all try to avoid doing so. Sometimes we are successful, sometimes we are not. Sometimes, because of the fear of walking on the wrong side of the road, we don’t even try to make choices, to decide for ourselves. We let others decide for our benefit. We give them the right to control our lives. Then one day we’ll wake up in a world we are not familiar with, a world that we don’t like and is not good for us, a world that other people had built around us. And we ask ourselves why this world exists. Because we let it! We didn’t build that world ourselves, but we let others build it around us, when all this time we should have said no, we should have decided that we will live the way we want to.

We can’t run away from slip-ups. It will always follow us wherever we go, would haunt us every time we are to decide. But should this prevent us from not making our own choices? Should this thwart us from taking this strange road instead of the usual one? We don’t know what awaits us at the end of the strange road, but how will we know if we don’t take it? How will we learn if we don’t make a decision, take a risk, and possibly commit a mistake?

Life will not be as fascinating and exciting as we know it to be if we can see how our little choices will affect our lives. We will not be able to welcome each day with thrill and curiosity if we are all given the power of forewarning like Raven and Alice Cullen. That’ll be dull and definitely boring. Good things happen. Shit happens. And we should all face these consequences and not constantly blame ourselves for not knowing better, because we can’t know better until knowing better is useless.

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a woeful & chaotic diary since 071409