Log #7

Log#7

"Let’s cross over." －Eat, Pray, Love

Eat, Pray, Love is one of the novels I read in my childhood. Liz had a marriage but failed it because she finally couldn’t really feel herself in this relationship. She escaped. Escaping from one relationship into another one but failed again, she couldn’t put up with “This is not me anymore”. Then, she was afraid to fall in love again. Due to the failure of love, Liz tried to find herself and explore through traveling. She prayed and loved and met many people during this journey. Without this self-exploration, she would not have found herself and found what she needed at last.  

I just reread this book. Different from me before, this time, it feels like reviewing myself. I think I am somehow similar to Liz. Or, I believe I must more or less have mimicked her since I knew her. For example, I pray like Liz does. I can’t remember when I started it, but at my miserable time, I pray. For the first time when I was praying, I felt a little bit weird and doubtful (just like Liz’s first pray); nonetheless, I’d done it, because I thought I must do it to offset my cynicism and pessimism. And it usually works. I pray every time when I think my life goes wrong－arguments with friends or family, broken heart of my love, pressure from academic and school clubs, and confusion on mu future…… Although I pray, I’m not pray to any religion or any God. Frankly speaking, I don’t exactly whom I am praying to. (Maybe to the sky, I guess.) However, it is pray that makes me appreciate people and things around me. It makes my attitude toward life better than before. More relieved. After rereading this book, I was reminded of my connection to Liz’s pray.

“Dear saint, please, please, please let me win the lottery.”
“My son, please, please, please buy a ticket.”

This is an Old Italian joke stated in this novel. Praying makes us relieved; however, we still have to take some action. This is also the main point of this book－dare to try. I think I’m alike Liz, but one thing I am lack of is courage. The courage to try. Therefore, after the college, after twice failed solo travel, after I was too confused to life, I finally decided to try something new: school club.

I joined in dance club in my first year of college because I adored and admired one of my friends as a dancer. I didn’t want to just envy her. Thus, I was with some of my classmates, with the hope that we would have a colorful freshman year, participating in this big club. However, things went below my expectation. We had to prepare for the final performance in the end of that year, but I found it challenging to learn the dance. With the same experience and the same practice, I was always behind others. Worse yet, I feared to make friends with others due to my uncofidence. I danced badly. And I thought I was even worse than any other one in that group. I lost all of my confidence in these days, but I was still praying. Yet, you know, things would not be better if you just pray for it. Additionally, dance practice took so much time that I had little time to take care for my relationship and thus, my boyfriend (now is ex-one) always had quarrels with me due to my neglect of him. I felt so miserable during these days. Everything went wrong.

I could either quit that stupid performance, but if I did, I might be blame by my peers (my dance group then) and had to bear the pressure. So I was on the stage on that day, eventually. At the very last moment, I was still anxious, fearful, strained. Up to the stage, I tried to finish the performance. Down the stage, I sobbed. I lost all my confidence from it because I knew I didn’t get it well done. You must want to blame me: why don’t you practice it perfectly before the performance? But it’s just because I couldn’t! It’s just like telling a tone-deaf to sing! I was disappointed with myself, too. Every time for practice dancing, I blamed myself before others blamed me. I was still devaluating myself.    

“I'm going for it. I have no interest in being obese. I'm just through with the guilt.”

Dance becomes one of my most fear things so that I will never, ever dance for performance anymore. Nevertheless, I know if I didn’t buy the ticket to dance, I will never have a chance to try, and I will regret for it, even I never won that "lottery". More importantly, I will never know I am not for there. Actually, I got nothing there, neither a good performance nor a group of good friends, but the experience. The experience to dance on the stage in front of hundreds of people (I danced badly, though). The experience to try something I have adored for. The experience to waste my time. The experience to quit everything I love and bury myself into one thing which I had lost my passion on. Life gives us chances to experience, and we’d better make as many as mistakes before we have a chance to experience all these mistakes. I doubted myself and felt isolated for several time during these three months effort; nevertheless, when it’s all ended, I felt relieved and became more independent. Still, I want to try something new, but next time, I know how to carefully make the choice.