Reply to 'focus'

(I confess - i haven't ACTUALLY read this yet - too drunk to bother. So instead, i copied and pasted Steph's recent comment of 'focus'. I'm sure it's very good. I'll read it soon. Please read it now. Regards, your imbecilic Ed. I love you X Yes, that's true. Though not you Frank - Frankly you're an arse.)

I think that the standards of success for more transient folk such as ourselves and more static people shouldn't be measured the same way. The static are fortunate, after all, to not have to concern themselves with things the transient do. They know their home, their friends, their local supermarket. Everyone seems to follow a comforting, reliable path because they don't have to uproot themselves every year or so. They have the stability necessary to nurture and develop themselves in ways they've always been taught are safe and good. I think, as far as Korea goes, it's hard to feel like you can advance in any direction. Just knowing it's temporary can make it feel like you're cutting into valuable time you could be spending getting your life together back home. Not to mention all of the other issues. There's little chance of upward mobility in the workplace, especially as a temporary foreign worker. Your housing, work environment, and a vast part of your quality of life are dictated by a chubby, angry baby behind a desk who you probably only catch a glimpse of once or twice a month from the corner of your eye. And on top of that, all of your relationships have a shelf life, and either your friends will leave you behind or vice versa, because you all have a home to go back to, but there's little chance of developing the kind of relationship that only time can grow. I think all of that directly affects our ability to focus and stay motivated. The focus bit because everything is constantly changing, and also, nothing really requires your attention for all that long. The motivation bit because it all makes you feel pretty helpless, because everything really is changing and there's nothing you can do to stop it. It’s hard to invest time and money and energy and love into our homes, our work, and our friends when they're all going to slip out of our grasp anyway. And helplessness has a way of bringing out the pessimism and self-loathing in us. (Then here are those assholes who just seem to be able to do everything at once with a smile on their face, but let's just ignore them like I usually do.) However, I think this isn't completely hopeless. One might sacrifice focus and motivation living this way, but in exchange you're getting a glimpse of reality outside of the box that's difficult to experience when you've never had to upend your life. You learn that people come and go and it's not going to matter what you say because those people have made a choice for themselves and themselves alone. And you learn how to do that for yourself and quit feeling sorry about disappointing anybody for daring to deviate from their expectations of you. I think the static life cripples people in that regard. You're around the same people your whole life and the image of you they've developed is so concrete in their mind that any attempts for you to crack away at that mold set off alarms, unwanted attention, or even ridicule. It's difficult to make change when you're ready for one. Familiarity is poison to humanity because either it makes us afraid to change, or even if we're not, everyone else is, and they decide to make it their business when you shake up their idea of how things ought to be, even in regards to your own personal life and choices that will have essentially no effect on them. And heaven forbid we upset or disappoint anybody.

I guess my point is that sure, everyone back home is growing up in the traditional sense. But you're growing out. If you're a tall tree, great, but you're going to be surrounded by a forest of things that look like you, just as tall, so there's no way to look up and over at what lies beyond. But if your branches stretch far and wide, well you might run into a few interesting things, learn to love the uncertainty, and even brighten up a tall tree's day. And humanity being foreign? I call bullshit. Domesticated life is like a pug. It's cute and fun, but it's wheezy and deep down it's really a twisted, mutated thing that 'humanity' has created and called 'dog' (to match our own mutated selves, of course). That kind of humanity was concocted in a lab and sold to us. It's not real, the paths we take, and a lot of people have a mid-life crisis over that kind of revelation. The closest glimpse of humanity one can see from within are in our connections with others. But uprooting yourself and surrounding yourself with others who have done the same, who want to sample other, all-natural, organic versions of humanity is what makes you familiar with the truth of what it really is. I'd say you're more well-versed in what it is than most people back home. Focus and motivation have evaded me for so long. At least I've learned this much and I can only hope those things will return to me once I've settled down and found my rut. Just my two cents, but I think you're not giving this enough time. All of those friends of yours who've moved on have changed. But so have you. Just in a different direction. Don't judge a fish on its ability to ride a bicycle. I'm sure they floundered around a lot at first, but since then, they've had time to find themselves and carve their own path because they've been chiseling at it longer. If you want the same, start chiseling. And if your path goes a little differently from theirs yet again, so be it. You do you.