Home is an imperative part of every person’s life. It is where we started to be shaped to who we will someday be. Home is our refuge, our protection. It is where everything is so secure that we feel we can do great things.
It is also where we start to be socially oriented. As we grow older, we gradually step out of that comfort zone. To where? To our second home, which is school.
School is where we make friends. We choose a clique that we feel we belong to. It is where we have that first step to decide on our own. We may have stumbled down from the wrong choices but yet, we managed to stand and be gracious about it.
School is where we first get giddy and have that very first infatuation with someone else. It is also where that green-eyed monster begin to come out from us. It is where the chances of feeling all sorts of emotions are very high.
Home and school for most people is what they consider “the life.”
Take that away and fire would definitely be flaring up!
For the past 19 years of my life, I have been so comfy with where I am and who I’m with. I have established a comfort zone for myself. That is, I have my friends that are always around and I can go to the usual places I know I can never be lost.
Then it hit me…
I am booked for a flight to USA.
Just the thought of living out the next years of my life in a foreign land is overwhelming! No friends, no sleepovers, no nothing! I was so used to having other people by me and now, I have to face the world alone.
It is like being born again. I have to start from scratch. Everything is so out of my league.
The whole place is exhilarating but I sure love to enjoy it with my friends and the other people I left. All the opportunities that life can ever offer is staring right back at me but I can’t seem to put a smile on my face because I am so nostalgic. All I wanted to do is go back-go back to my comfort zone.
It took a little push from my friends to finally get myself together and stop having that defeatist attitude. Well it is true that at the start, everything would feel like the first day of school. I have to introduce myself (a lot of time, I may say!), get used to the new environment, and of course, scout for new friends.
Just as Brooke Davis said, “this is my life and I am making a stand for it.” I can make this game go my way. For that to happen, I have to be ME.
A lot of people think that a new environment equals a new persona. Isn’t being in a foreign land a struggle enough?! So why do people have to pretend to be someone they’re not just to fit in?!
It is hard to be the newbie but I never want to change just to belong. I already know that there will be rejections waiting ahead for me. Hey, there will always be a bad day—live with it.
I am all alone now and the only one I can lean on is myself. If I have a resistance with myself, then I would definitely be a loser. So I have to begin with myself. I have to believe in me, and before I know it, for sure, people will learn to believe in me too.
I brought here with me that mantra I have back in the Phils. That is, “I love myself, and if you don’t, who the hell cares!”
One thing I know for sure is that I will not be another Cady Heron (Mean Girls) that wanted to fit in so bad that she ended up being such a total b****. I am not afraid to be branded as a geek or a complete freak because at the end of the day, I’d still be happy with who I am and they’d still be kissing someone else’s ass just to fit in.
Without doubt, I would really be on a lot of dead ends but certainly, there will always be a road I can turn to and rise to the moment just as long as I stay true to myself.
When I left Philippines, I thought it is the end.
Turns out, my life is just beginning…
