Breathe

It's that time of the semester. Assignments and project deadlines are just around the corner. Essays are due. Meetings after meetings after meetings. And the examinations are just waiting ahead to deal the final blow to our already miserable student life.

It's that time when everybody start posting hate tweets about their lecturers and project group mates, when people start writing doom posts on their blogs and become very emo on Facebook.

It's that time of the semester when I have to wake up early every single morning to go for project meetings or lessons and have 2 essays waiting for me to write and I have no mood to write either and have decided to blog instead. Oh, the irony!

I felt a little overwhelmed during yesterday's(Tuesday) lecture. It wasn't the content of the lecture. HL105 has always been rather easy for simple-minded people like me. (unlike HL107, Classical Literature for Masters in Philosophy)

It was really the accumulation of readings and project works and lectures and tutorials and church and life and everything else that comes with it. It happens sometimes: when you suddenly feel as if everything is so heavy and overwhelming you can hardly catch your breath before the next something catches up on you and says "HEY START WORK NOW! START WORK NOW!"

It's horrible, this endless race and this paper chase. I tell myself to be more optimistic about it. I even tell others to cheer up. I tell them that we are not here to be educated, but to experience education. I give myself a new reason to go to school each day other than to study. But still, I have to admit, it's difficult. GPA remains a fact that we have to grapple with. It's there. It's staring at us. It holds the key to our future. How can I just simply ignore it?

But even so, we are not robots. We may be cultivated like one, we may be educated like one, but WE ARE NOT ROBOTS. Give yourself a break. I have to give myself a break. I am not here to be educated, I am here to experience education. That still holds true to me. GPA is still important to me. But I won't put my soul down on the altar for GPA's sake.

I may be overwhelmed, I may feel burdened, but no, it's not going to bring me down. If I need to step out of lecture theatre and take a breather, I will. I will breathe the air, the natural and non-air-conditioned air. I will let the fresh air fill my lungs again.

I will breathe. I am human.