my heart beats for me, not you

It has been such a terribly long time.

Today marks the end of my third week at internship. Only 19 weeks left to go. I wouldn't say I'm counting, but is it bad that I don't have to dig deep into the recesses of my mind to remember how much time there is left till the end? ... Well, I have always been good with dates and numbers like that. I say like that, because I'm terrible at History - which is why I never pursued it after lower secondary. But that's irrelevant.

It is hard to not feel anxious about school. I am in a school where I am surrounded by passionate, driven, smart, big-hearted, all-round mostly awesome individuals and I find my feelings often caught in a limbo between awe and motivation and self-deprecation and unworthiness. Dare I admit that it's probably because I haven't found my place yet - in a place I was to call home for 4 years, in a place where I would spend the final (for now) years of my formal education - rather than not doing well enough academically? Yes, I do.

Going on internship scared me. Every semester scared me. The anxiety is in-es-ca-pa-ble. Why? Because it matters. It matters so much. As I approach my final year, one of my biggest fears rose up to the surface although it had always been bubbling underneath, of course. I didn't want to be the girl who had to join an fyp group that didn't want her, unwanted by a group of 3 who only agreed to accept her because the school 'forced' them to. I wasn't close with enough people. I didn't know if people knew what I was capable of (or what I wasn't capable of). I existed, people knew my name, but I was never really there.

But things work out, as they always do. Two weeks ago, I got my complete fyp group of 4. Not out of force, as I had always feared, but a group formed from a mutual desire to work together on a project that would be meaningful, that we felt we could create and contribute to together. Here's hoping it works out to it working out /raisesglass

I'm still struggling to let go -

To not compare myself to the ghostly ideas I have of people. But that's that, they're just ideas in my head. They're not real. To not feel small just because others are better than I am different from me. I want to always be conscious of other's struggles, that beneath all our differences, we are all essentially the same - kindred spirits. I want to find myself, find my place, let my happiness shine through as I watch others emit their own happiness, to not let it be stifled by anxiety and ranks I have unintentionally subjected myself to.

There are no dichotomies. Evil / Good. Black / White. Happy / Sad. Different / Same. It is never that simple. I must remember that in my desire to not fit into a particular mold, I cannot force myself to fit into another. We are fluid. We can be whoever we want to be.