Some Words On '自由'

On the short-lived journey to prepare myself for the field of medicine, I, along with my peers, were very well aware of the level of difficulty and stress we would be facing. Classes we were not so fond of had to be dealt with, and it was imperative to temporarily (by this, I mean 4-8 years.. or more?) sacrifice our current well-being for the greater good of being a certified physician or surgeon by the time we were 30. Many people saw this suffering through a 300 person lecture on chemistry with the worst professor worth it, but I could not. And a part of me was starting to think that maybe, just maybe, my animosity towards the nature of this "journey" was a sign that the natural sciences were just not for me.

So after coming back from an bitter-cold, intensive, yet liberating trip around some parts of Europe, the first thing I did was drop all the courses I had signed up for the previous semester. It was like burning all pictures of my disgusting ex-boyfriend, watching the flame lick at his face, and slowly contorting it, eventually reducing it to pathetic ashes (as you can see, I really hated him). That feeling of freedom and victory - that anything could be possible now that one life problem was out of the way.

And you will never believe it. I actually think I am happy, because I am in classes that I actually enjoy. I want my professors to throw me an extra 100 more pages of reading every night, because as stressful as the work may be, I love every minute of it. Isn't that insane? Who knew education could actually be fun? And I have freedom to study what I choose? I would have never guessed that I had options! In general, things are profoundly different when you actually do what you want rather than what you believe you are obligated to do.

"Well yes, Jackie, this is all self-explanatory. Everyone knows that to be true."

But with the constraints we have in our individual situations within the boundaries of our culture and society, freedom can only go so far. And freedom - what does that even mean in the first place? How can one achieve freedom when the definition of it is so malleable? It is certainly something worth speculating over, although to do so on this blog would only leave an endless page of immature, disorienting, under-developed thoughts in writing. I will most likely rant about it later.

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In the past few weeks, I have found myself stationed at the large desktops at school with close to 30 different tabs open. This accurately reflects my train of thought - too many things to think about at once, and the unfortunate thing about me is that I have the attention span of something slightly better than a goldfish. So after reading a couple paragraphs of Brazilian transgendered prostitutes, I will have an itching feeling to switch my music to Modest Mouse, and then start looking up nice places to eat in Tokyo for my upcoming trip.

Thankfully, the panic is starting to settle down as my spontaneous trip to Japan is drawing near. I have to say, this is probably the most successful I have been with my packing skills. I remember my first trip overseas, I brought 6 shirts and 3 bottoms that I ended up never using. Luckily, every time seems to be getting easier.

This, plus an extra pair of shoes and my laptop/charger will be everything I am bringing:

Oddly enough, the weight of my backpack for this trip is significantly lighter than the amount of things I carry to class everyday. That makes me both proud to have improved packing skills, but also sad that I burden myself with so much unnecessary weight on a daily basis.

My take on Japan will be coming soon. Until then~

ジャッキー

#Japan #travel