Issue No. 71

There are times when I ask myself, "What is the point of all this?"

This.

This life.

Every day, we breathe the same air, walk the same Earth, live in the same body. It does feel tiring, doesn't it? We didn't choose to be here, yet here we are, surviving the monsters of our own creation, the tragedies of our distant past, and the promise of an uncertain future.

Are we alive just to experience the world? Is that the point of it all? There must be something more. I sometimes find no meaning in vanity. Yes, I am privileged—I can travel where I want, eat what I want, I have a roof over my head, and enjoy luxuries many don't. But what is the point if, in the end, none of it will stay with me?

Do you know that most of the things you own won't be with you in seven years? Your devices last only three to five years before they stop working. Perishable goods like food disappear within a week. In five to ten years, your friends will live far away and lead different lives far different from what you will have chosen.

I sometimes feel as if I've missed a lifetime back in my country before I arrived in Korea. It's been eight years since I left. I no longer feel the same about the place where I grew up. With each passing year, it becomes more of a stranger. I haven't seen my parents in seven years. There's a stinging pain when I think of the alternate timeline where I could have stayed. But I know I couldn't. I was destined for something else.

You see, I was a dreamer. I always have been. The difference is, my dreams come true, and at times they become nightmares. When I obsessed about living abroad, every cell in my body worked to make it happen—and it did. It gave me confidence that I could do anything. But to what end, I asked. Now that I’ve achieved it, so what? What's next? What's the next goal, the next prize I'm going to pursue? Travel to more countries? Buy more clothes? Get a car, a house? Start a family, bring a child into this world? And then what? Will I feel satisfied?

There are moments when the wind blows no more, and the night is silent as the deep sea, that I imagine myself at 70 years old. What would I look back on? What memories would I be happy to relive? Which ones would I wish I could experience again? Once I have those ideas, I set a time to accomplish them. It gives me a sense of control, a touch of certainty in this world of uncertainties.

Maybe the point of it all is to live a life I'd be happy to reflect on just before I take my last breath—a life that I, myself, have willed into reality. Only then could I say, I have truly lived. It will be a testament that among the trillions of people who have lived and perished, I was one of them who made a small dent in one corner of the world; flesh and bones with a heartbeat.

I wish I could see myself from the future. Would I be looking forward toward my end, or back to where I am now? I am almost certain that I’ll miss the very moment where I sit. And, you know what, maybe that's enough evidence that I’m in the right place…

…at the right time.

Let's keep looking forward, then.

P.S. Had to fix that title mistake :)

Until next week,