Dopey– The Rant Monologue

I have a Black Dog. His name is Dopey. Yes he dopes me, but that is not because he is so adorable that I am falling head over heels with him. In fact if I had a choice, I would not want ownership of this mastiff terrier at all.

 

Yes– he was given to me somewhere in my early years, perhaps in part for my family heritage and in part for the style in which my family is run, the bigger extent of which I do not know.

 

All I know is– this pet is a monster.

 

And that is because he bites me every few months when he is in a bad mood (sometimes more frequent). And as if nonchalant of what excruciating pain he inflicts on me, he chooses to hold on for days. Sometimes weeks. Sometimes even months.

 

I wish I could get rid of Dopey, but every time I disown him, he comes right back looking for me with a vengeance. And bites me of course.

 

People think I am such an eccentric character, because of the scars from Dopey on my heart and on my head. In fact, people often get exasperated or scared because they do not understand why I still want to keep Dopey. Problem is– I do not keep Dopey. Dopey wants to keep me, and when he expresses that desire, he realizes that I fight hard to get what I want too. Which brings me to an even more perennial problem now– it is getting very tiring for me to fight, and I need ammunition from family and friends. But because they still choose to define me for who Dopey is (I AM NOT DOPEY AND DOPEY IS NOT ME. IT IS JUST THAT HE LIKES TO CLING ON TO ME.), and not who I am beyond that black dog hanging off my front, they are strangely unsympathetic.

Oh well, I must learn that it is good enough that Prince understands I guess.

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“I think this man might be useful to me – if my black dog returns. He seems quite away from me now – it is such a relief. All the colours come back into the picture.”

- Winston Churchill (on his manic depression)

 

If Winston Churchill was alive today, he will understand my parable-like writing above completely. Or at least much more than many people around me care to. Yes I have clinical depression. Dopey is his name.

 

In actual fact, I have no idea why I have chosen to be so introspective and have a tell-all entry today. Perhaps it is a cry for help in the midst of the most painful and longest Dopey periods I have had in a while. Perhaps it is exasperation from the lack of understanding from everyone around me. Perhaps after so long of counselling and giving to people who fight with their Dopeys too, Cel just wants to rant at someone who can understand and love her too, without judging her character based on Dopey. Perhaps Cel is just tired…

 

Dopey did not take to biting me when I first met him in my elementary school years. While it is true that from time to time, he will rear his head menacingly at me when the verbal abuse and conflict at home got too intense, I was generally spared his razor teeth. However, that changed abruptly when my Dad passed away in Primary 5.

 

After that, it seemed like Dopey lost all decorum and control in my life. He clung on to me and recklessly bit whichever area of my mental and emotional life he could find, and try as I might, I never seemed to have enough power to shake him off. Dopey refused to leave even when I invited Hermione (a metaphor for my Obsessive-Compulsion Disorder– I will talk about her another day) to help me take charge of my life. I wanted control so badly to overcome this idiot of a dog, but it seemed the more I tried, the more out of control my life became and I appeared to others. Schoolmates started to point and jeer, analysing the “girl who always want to commit suicide”.

 

The doctor put me on medication. I took that self-lobotomizing drug only to realise that not only did Dopey not leave, Hermione left me helpless and I could not function at the same level of excellence I was used to. As I felt severely impaired, I said goodbye to medication after 2 years. And by the grace of God, I somehow found a way to work around his bites and the accompanying pain to keep operating, keep operating, keep operating…

 

Then I came back to Prince. How joyful was the occasion! He promised me freedom, He promised me peace, He promised me joy (though on hindsight He never did say He would give that to me instantaneously). In the sheer delight of my reconciliation with this perfect Being whom I had abandoned for 7 years, it seemed like Dopey had left for good. Nothing that came my way seemed to break me– I was on-the-ball Cel always having inexhaustuble enthusiasm for everything she does no matter the circumstance. And I started to share with others how amazing it was that Dopey had left me by the power of God.

 

What I did not know was that Dopey had never left. It was simply that my mind and heart had gotten so used to the pain I was numb to his presence. In addition, Hermione was totally out of control in my life at that time (to my sweet oblivion coz I used to love her so much), and I spent so much time feeding on her power of perfectionism I forgot Dopey was there. And though I had a faint inkling that this was definitely not the status quo Prince wanted me to stay in, I persevered in my quest for perfectionism nevertheless, even extending it to how I treat people and… Prince. I believed that anything short of near-perfect excellence in my actions and achievements was tantamount to a disaster.

 

Prince, as if to hint at the work He was to do in my mind and heart, allowed cracks to appear in my facade at this point of time. On one hand, I was the ever-giving, smiling, enthusiastic ball-of-positive-energy Cel; on the other hand, Dopey was wrecking havoc on my life again once 2 months, if not a month or 2 weeks– episodes of which I would explain to my friends as “burn-outs” (“I’m just too stressed don’t worry.” HEY I’M NORMAL!!!). All this led up to when I was in SOT. Then Prince, in sledgehammer style, clobbered Hermione to death and gently explained to me that I will be better off without clinging on to her. I was devastated, not least when Dopey attacked me in full force and almost drove me to contemplate death again. He leeched onto me for a month.

 

And once again, it was by the sheer grace of God, as well as all the loving team mates He had placed around me, that I pulled through that period. During that time, Prince gently helped me to come to terms with aspects of my past, as well as my self-identity that did not have to be defined by Hermione, by what I did. I picked up in momentum. By leaning on Prince, I felt strong, unshakable, and thought that I had gotten past the worst of my life (though Prince kept hinting that my healing needs time and it is not that simple). And this state of increasing momentum and self-confidence was sustained for 3-4 months, until…

 

Recently I burnt out/ got bitten by Dopey again. And so far it has lasted for 3 weeks. I don’t know how long this is going to last. I can only pray and hope, pray and hope. Besides this, I pray and hope for understanding and capacity for my family and friends who still cannot seem to come to terms with my ‘episodes’.

 

Please I am not trying to scare any of you, be dependent on any of you, and I am not crazy. Cel is still Cel, if you bother to look beyond Dopey and the ghost of Hermione. But do you? Or have I become a problem, a responsibility, a lesser being the moment I cannot do anything for people and all of you realize the full extent of my problems? Please give Prince and me some credit for having fought so hard for so long. At the end of the day, I just need lots of space to be myself. At the end of the day, I just need the people who matter to me in my life to not tell me to “snap out of it” as if I am not trying, or to shun me because I am not in full functioning order. The Cel you know is still fighting her way to the surface. At the end of the day, I just long for those moments with God, loved ones, music and quality fellowship. Please don’t deny me even the basic respect of desiring that like any human being.

 

Please stay.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pantomime

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players…”

– As You Like It, William Shakespeare

At least that is what the world (society) would have us believe. None of us is birthed into this world completely devoid of imposed expectations. When parents embrace their newborn in their hands, they envision a successful lawyer, musician, business man. When teachers pour their time and hearts into educating a new generation of potential to-bes, they envision valedictorians and self-sufficient entrepreneurs in their midst. Even in the most intimate of relationships, one is not exempt from the seeming obligations of being a good friend, lover, spouse. Perhaps the greatest whip-bearer is often oneself, assuming what is expected, driving oneself incessantly towards a goal supposedly validating the roles in life, not always knowing the purpose behind the relentless pursuit.

Perhaps because role-playing was my way of life before I found my Prince. Perhaps because my raging ambition would not expect anything less of myself. It is so seductively easy for me to fall into a mindset and lifestyle of fulfilling roles, without being truly happy. Oh yes, the initial thrill of meeting self-expectations does bring immense pleasure, but then again there is a very fine line between joy- which is eternal, and pleasure- which is temporal. Then when I fall in, I find myself trapped in a net, a never-ending highway where my “four wheels can’t stop turning but the engine’s breaking down” (a description courtesy of a certain best friend). I am thankful that when I cannot save myself, Prince still pulls me out of the net, pushes the emergency brake on my engine and reignites it each time.

But we are not created to be merely players. We are not made unique in and of ourselves to run our lives trying to be the best chessman on a gigantic chessboard of society. We are created to be ourselves and to simply live just as we are. Because who we are, just being, even without doing, is sufficient to make an impact on this world. And grandeur plans of impacting society aside, even if we are never to accomplish anything in this “pantomime”, the Creator (Prince) adores and loves each one of us just we are—whether we be sleeping, waking, eating, working, or simply helpless. Because what we do or fail to do does not alter the person we are inside. Essentially, our character is NOT our role. And because of this love for who we just are- our being, we can afford to live lives of eternal purpose free from trying to fulfill any role.

Depressed and comatose on a mattress of a friend’s apartment, You whispered to me, “Cel, if you want to know who you are, know first that you are strong.” My life has been far from perfect or ideal, but You have given me a confidence that I’m awesome simply to have pressed on till today. In the thrall of Your presence, You have called me peace, joy and love. Things I would never be (considering the tumultuous struggles of my clinical depression and OCD) without Your Potter hands in my life. You have called me courageous. And above all, You have called me a Princess and Queen- names I initially took with great pressure because I have always perceived them as roles to work towards somehow; You tell me otherwise- regardless of what I do, the manifestation of royalty in my life does not change. You tell me nothing and nobody can take the crown away from me, as long as I keep being myself.

We are who we think. And a fine line resides in the mindset of ‘role’ and ‘character’.  Focus on the ‘roles’ of our existence, what we have to do, and the anxieties and pressures of life will eventually cave in on us. Focus on the ‘character’ of our being, of discovering it through the eyes of the Prince as we commune daily with Him, and we will find a true joy and passion of being that will shine through our lives into the lives of others. It’s not easy to straddle this balance- societal pressures will always attempt to push us towards the former, and it is probably a journey a lifetime will not be adequate for, but stand firm in waiting on Him for the latter, and a world of immense possibilities will keep revealing itself to us.

Prince, this is my cry. Hear our cry, they say. Hear my cry to learn to breathe, to BE. I want to keep trusting You, keep living life happy. Sometimes it’s just so hard for me to believe that I can receive anything without a fight, but with You all things are possible, and I want to hold on to that. Rather than always trying too hard, help me to lean on You. You have promised to be my shield, my rampart, my Prince in shining armor behind whom I can dwell while charging into the Promised Land.

Thank You for calling me a friend. And thank You for all the friends You have placed in my life who call me friend. Thank You for reminding me that no matter what I do, my existence does make a difference and if I were to disappear, it would matter to them, to You. I don’t want to forget this.

I want to live life being myself in His hand, not some player in a cosmic pantomime…

Black and White

Finally after such a long hiatus, I’m back to blogging! 4 months… but so many life-changing events and transformations have occurred in this short span of time that I hope never to forget. The mountain tops, the valleys, the painful or ecstatic, all have contributed to the profound alterations to my life.

I don’t want to go through the same cycle again, because I want to look forward. At the same time, I want to hold each and every lesson I have learnt in the past 4 months close to my heart. Above all, I want to hold each and every single experience I have had with Him close to my heart.

One does not have to look for the spiritual only in spiritual/ religious acts. One looks for the spiritual, for a continuim of relationship with the Maker, in the entire journey of life. And as much as all that has occurred is only the beginning, I thank Him that He has opened my eyes to how real living life with Him is.

But all these things I will save penning down till a time when I am not so bogged down by my academic semester. This is really a very challenging semester (6 modules!!!) and I need all of His grace to manage something I had always been bad at– TIME.

For now, I will just leave everyone with some random shots of wonderful time spent with my SOT team mates in school. Team 20, I miss you guys super. Really thank God for each and every one of you, and I thank Him for those of you who are in NUS with me, moving from one chapter of life to another together.

Jianhao with the master student’s anointing and the master student’s look =P

Fellowship, and by extension, relationships are really what makes dreary school life memorable, especially when…

Kelvin gets up to his over-the-top drama antics. JIALAT…

“Oi! Why FB everytime pangseh me one?” =P

Finally, this is for Adi…

Introducing in its full green precipitate color… CELERY JUICE.

No matter where we are called to in future, may our friendship continue to grow and strengthen.