A Note to Self.

Dear Self,

Ten years ago, you were brimming with hope. I know you miss the 'feeling'. You entered 30 with enthusiasm. You felt you were doing a Carrie in the Sex and the City, perhaps minus Mr. Big. You thought you had so much energy to spend. You felt you had so much love to share. You looked forward to being stable, to feeling stable, to feeling great about life under your control. 

But Life happened. Work did not always give you the full-time satisfaction. There was the struggle but there was also the joy. You persevered, grew, and prevailed. Imagine you stayed for 10 years! In the meantime, your friends began to reveal themselves. You thought your friends would stay but some changed and faded away from your radar. Your father passed away at a time when you were so eager in the drawing board of your coming of adulthood, only for you to shelve your plans away. You had an international break but you struggled with anxiety in a non-English speaking country and you chose to see the gloomy side of things. Your siblings began creating their own lives. You struggled to not cry in their weddings. You are proud of them but you could not help but when you see your sisters are being fetched by their husbands, you could not help but think, what about me?

Oh your 30s, there were full of life so why do you feel a bit discomforting when you look back? In your 30s, you learned to let go. You began to stop comparing. You began to think of people who matter to you as you matter to them and you try to hold onto it.  You began to listen. You began to stop talking.

'So what was it like for you when you were in your 40s?', you asked a colleague. 'Don't sensationalize it, but you will feel a different confidence that you will wonder where did it come from. You don't care about anything, but you still work out for your security, passion, goals. You will get them. Being 40s is a process but definitely you feel some physical manifestations', he said. Body aches, sagging skin, gaining weight, looming high blood pressure, you need to watch out for it.

It makes you think what kind of confidence this new phase is bringing. I know you have been impatient lately so I hope the confidence will help you to become patient. You long for focus despite all the distractions so I hope the confidence can bring you the tools to deep dive.

More than ever, I do hope this new phase is a call to courage, a call to 'dare greatly' for you. However it means, there is a new excitement this brings. I hope you bring in more focus, more intensity, more completeness. For the past ten years, you had always told yourself, 'I lost that feeling forever'. I do not even know it. Perhaps, the feeling is 'groove', 'mojo', 'passion'. To reclaim what once lost, to redraw again. I know you will work it out and prevail. 

One day sooner, you will find the 'feeling' again.