35,000 ft in the air and fusion music. O the air up there. A blend of Brazilian and desert groove...and the placement is not lost on me. Seems an appropriate setting--confined to a pressurized cabin, two people over from a 1.5ft aisle and absolutely no where to go...the music allows your mind to wander, like being in a dream, to far away places.
Six days back, getting on a plane...starting the next part of my professional journey...
five days back, exhaustion--training, conference calls, documents in half finished stages, reviewing the lessons learnt...
four nights back, a realization that I havent felt the sun on my face--the warmth and clarity of non-recycled air...
three days back--cohesiveness, conceptual roadblocks cleared up--and clicking if you will of the material, and finally a realization that I am free to walk outside, to the K petrol station and buy as much junkfood as I choose--and I laugh to myself because this is the most exciting nonconforming thing I am doing (and yes, who cares, but this course of action is a huge variation in the process)...
two days back, three prentations--and an annihilation of fear--a triggering of fulfilling action--a recognition once again--"go to the places that scare you"--and when you really look, it's just the immensity of the story that you told yourself and not reality that held you back (thank you Peng, Julie, Joel, Mike)...
and the final day, the day where you bear your soul, where you stand up and try to illustrate concisely what exactly you are trying to accomplish, how you will go about measuring and substantiating--the final day, and a short exam...
and these days, the past days ran through my head--what did I miss, what have already forgotten, what will the next session be like? will I fail, will I be ill-prepared, will my next set of questions be appropriate, will I feel the adrenaline rush--the excitement--and will I have the will to push beyond the self-imposed barriers again?...
return to 35k feet in turbulence...seems appropriate, turbulence breaking you out of your thoughts--and on the headset is a song called, "Scars", the chorus goes, "I tear my heart open, I sew myself shut / My weakness is that I care too much / And my scars remind me that the past is real / I tear my heart open just to feel". And the lyrics bring me to a mail a friend wrote about walking through the rain and how rain represents the tears that cannot be cried and a cleansing of the pain felt in one's heart. Only I think you are supposed to embrace it rather than cleanse it. There is no forgetting, or wiping away--there is no cleansing or separation, there is only acceptance and acknowledgement and a learning to be learnt.
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Morning after...grounded.