choose life?

I've clearly lost what it means to be a living, breathing human being.

I came to this realisation tonight, on my study break night, while surfing the net and reading random blogs. My life has ceased to be interesting, in stark contrast to some of these bloggers who live such fascinating lives. This used to be my life one year ago, what happened? I've spent the last two months worrying about this stupid exam, isolating myself in an attempt to stay focused, but what have I got to show for it?

I should be out there, living life, experiencing life, and enjoying life for all it has to offer. I should be out there trying new things and meeting new people, instead of repeatedly poring over the same books over and over again, in an attempt to commit things to memory. I'm losing what should be the best years of my life, to overeducating myself on things that I won't recall in five years' time. All for what, a foot in the door of a brilliant career? A hundred years ago, we wouldn't have been so caught up in these tests and exams, such man-made institutions, such artificial constructs.

I used to be the one who says, "you only live once, so you should try everything once." That version of me never searched for the meaning of life, for he already knew: that life is meant to be lived, not wasted. I've clearly lost sight of that person, and I need to bring him back.

27 dresses, 1 good thing

So I decided to take a break from studying tonight and watch a movie (I seem to be doing that a lot lately). I finally settled on 27 Dresses. Despite the insipid characterisation and formulaic plot, I did find myself enjoying Katherine Heigl's performance, which surprised me since I never thought of her as much of an actress. (I didn't enjoy Knocked Up, I dislike her silly character on Grey's Anatomy and I never got into Roswell.) She has an undeniable charm that radiates through her cliché of a character, Jane, and manages to throw herself fully into the role without overplaying it. Despite being a walking stereotype, Jane was easy to empathise with: surely everyone has played second fiddle to someone else at some point in their life. I'm not going to bother picking on the bad things about the movie (i.e. everything else), but it was a pleasant enough distraction to make me not regret wasting 2 hours I could've used studying... I hope.

One more thing - Heigl's character Jane said something that I thought was so true, early in the movie: (paraphrased) "Some things in life are not easy, but cynicism always is." It's too easy for me to fall into the trap of cynicism, and in my pessimistic mood I tend to limit myself, both in what I can do and what I think I deserve. Optimism is hard work, and I really admire those friends of mine with eternally sunny dispositions. With me, I'm always far too sedate to brighten any room (unless I've been drinking, that is).