The Problem With Asking For Things We Aren’t Ready For

It’s one thing to recognize what you want, all the more, what you need. However it actually is a whole new world to be a persistent asker for something you think you deserve, but really are not prepared for.


Tons of money. A fulfilling career. Peace of mind. The love of your life.

Who wouldn’t want these things? 
Who wouldn’t feel a slight hint of envy over people who seem to have them all?

I remember my last relationship. It was a lot like the weather Manila has right now: Gloomy, muddy, smug, and tumultuous. But, just like the people who stay outside despite the warnings, I was hard-headed too. I held on to my last straw… maybe even made myself believe that that straw was longer than it truly was.

Every morning though, I woke up with haze in my eyes, wondering if the situation will ever change. ‘Cause that’s what we all hold on to with our dear lives: the hope of change and improvement that may never come. I already saw what was going on, people around me figuratively knocked me out with verbal jabs here and there just to try to shake me up. What they didn’t know was I was awake. I just didn’t want to get up.

At night I think of my ideal relationship: comfortable and loving, accepting and exciting, relaxed and surprising, compatible and unique. These thoughts always made me believe even more, fueling my urge to fight for love another day, incessantly trying to fit the present with this vague yet warm dream…

It never did. The process felt like a long road trip. 
“Are we there yet?” I asked over and over again like a bored, lethargic child in the backseat. Repeatedly, it was a steadfast, harsh and unforgiving “No”.

Apparently, despite the sweetest words, and the most cunning guarantees, without commensurate follow throughs, the heart does grow tired, weary and callous. Then one day, dawn will shine on a horizon reason can’t reach, and you just walk away.

Similarly, we all are wishers, dreamers, and thinkers. We make plans, we even act on them sometimes… but we keep a part of us chained, chasing the opposite direction. We can’t move on if we remain stationary. For every little thing we hold on to, we have to let something else go.

The distance from where I shot my unrelenting questions to the clear answer was a single step – one I needed to take before I can even work on getting what I wanted and dreamt of. It was only after that morning of resolution did I see the glass box I grappled myself in. And for the first time my woken mind and subconscious agreed on the same thing…

“We’re here.”

It wasn’t the incapability to move, nor the absence of desire to carry on. The problem was and will always be the choice of staying clutched to the seemingly certain present despite the foreseeable bright future.