the stranger in the mirror
written: 3:25 a.m. on Monday, Dec. 01, 2003

If you can, you're a bloody genius.

All I feel right now is immense stress and insurmountable pressure. I'm enervated and it has got nothing to do with my not sleeping despite my brains already shutting down.

SAT on Saturday. The more I do the tests, the more confused I get. The more I do the bloody analogy questions, the more mistakes I make.

So I have decided to stop doing the damn thing and just memorise new words.

But I feel so unsettled by this decision, like I should be doing something but I'm not doing it, ergo, something is wrong.

Yes, something is wrong. Terribly wrong. It's subtle but it's making its presence felt. It's pressing down on me, gently, but I feel it all the time, at the back of my mind or suffocating me.

There's so much I have to do. Too much I have to do. I haven't written in my personal diary for weeks and it's making me feel like I'm not doing something right.

This is not the way to live.

But what the heck can I do about it? I'm shackled to the chains of this screwed up system until I get my 'A' Level certificate at the end of next year. There's no way to break the metal chains for they are tough and strong.

And I'm succumbing to its insanity. I'm giving in to Singapore's education system. I'm losing out. Because I'm becoming an over-achiever, one of those people I used to scorn at.

Why do I need four As? No, correction; I don't need four As. I only want them. But why? What would it prove? That I'm smart? But I thought I already knew that grades do not reflect upon a person's intelligence in any way, shape or form.

Why do I want to excel in academic-related work so badly now? Because I've never done so in the past? And so what? Why can't I just go on living like I did, not giving a shit about grades and not getting so stressed over something as puny as the SAT?

Why do I care? Why? Why do I need to validate myself through my grades? Why do I feel inadequate upon learning that someone in school did better than me for the promotional exams?

Why do I need to be the best?

I could shirk responsibility away from myself and blame it on the insanity of the Singaporean education system, the extremely exam-oriented environment that I grew up in, my society's heavy emphasis on paper qualification -- I could do that. It would be easy. Too easy.

But I wouldn't, because if I did, I still wouldn't be any step closer to attempt to figure out what the hell happened to me between getting rid of the 'O' Levels last year and now.

And boy, dammit, god fucking dammit, I would really love to fucking know.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010