Depart Again, To Return Home

We shall not cease from exploration, 

and the end of all our exploring 

will be to arrive where we started 

and know the place for the first time.

Not knowing

It is an uncomfortable place to be, not knowing “what am I going to do in life.”

To have the leisure of pondering this question, is already a privilege that one can not take lightly. To have options, none of them a bad one, is an even more precious gift -- and a first world problem.

Over the past year, I have been answering this question in the negative, through a process of elimination. “I don’t want to do this.” “No, not that one, either.” And on and on. 

But, there’s only that many negative answers one can give, and only that many months of inaction one can endure, before the obvious ultimatum arrives: so, what exactly do you want to do?

Going Vegan & Two Meals A Day

Last night, I had a dream.

A pure-black calf walked to me, smiled and snuggled, so innocent and trusting, and licked my hand. I half-awoke from the dream, and cried with tears of joy, gratitude, and repentance.

The context was: the day before, I finally resolved to take milk out of my diet, effectively going vegan.

Knew It, Start Again

I am tempted to say that “I knew it.”

After college, I chose the safe and rational path of going into the business world -- corporate environmental sustainability consulting, to be precise. It offered a “real job” (comprehensible and acceptable by family acquaintances back home in China), steady income, health insurance, work visa, a deck of hip business cards printed on 100% recycled paper, and a platform to “change the world for the better.”

However, deep down, my gut knew that this is not it. If you ask me since when have I known that I would leave this work, I would say, “before I started.”