Work. Study. Plans. Life lately

So I officially quited my work per June 15th 2011. It was a good closure. My bosses and colleagues from Singapore were here and I got farewell lunch and dinner.

Here's a photo of me and my colleagues.

So that was TS Marketing SEA (minus my boss and one person). The interesting thing about my former department is that the people come from various countries. We had 1 American, 1 Argentinian, 1 Vietnamese, 1 Malaysian, 1 Thai, and 2 Indonesians. Oh, and there's a new guy from India whom I've never met. No Singaporean though the regional office is in Singapore.

One chapter in my life is now closed.

Now that my master study will start in September, I'm enjoying my "free" time. I have to admit that at first I was worried about how things were going to be. When I ask someone who just got back from a holiday, the common answer is: "holiday is nice but always too short". I was worried if my holiday is too long.

Not that I don't like holiday, but from past experiences when I got too much free time, I tended to do nothing useful and at the end of each day I felt like I had been wasting my time and them I'd feel bad about myself.

Fortunately, I do have several things to be done in this so-called-holiday. I still wake up early as usual, still take shower before 9 AM, and fill up my to-do notes. Different 'kind of to-dos. I no longer have any bullet with "finish rig count report" or "call state govt" or "arrange a meeting with commercial". My bullets are now mostly dominated with ReadingWalk's stuffs, family thingy, and apartment research (I am offering my Mom's apartments for rent and sell, btw).

It's not as intense as working at the office because now I set my own pace. I don't know yet whether this is good or bad. When I meet my collage friends sometimes I envy them for still having that working routine, knowing that they will be paid every 25th in each month; the consistency that I no longer have now. However, I realize that at this moment I am in the point of no return. I won't call off my study and go back to corporate life. That phase has passed and, according to my plan now, I've left it for good.

Every once in a while I ask myself, am I doing the right thing? Life's running so fast sometimes it scares me. Or maybe it's just about time. I am now in a period of time when many big decisions need to be taken and I doubt myself countless times.

I have dreams for myself and people that I dearly care about. I feel like I have opened the door to those dreams but I am afraid to take the next step. What if I mess up? I've messed up so many times in my life, I should have got an award for that. What if anything that I do now will cost me my dreams in the future? What if I'm not happy in the next 5, 10 or 20 years? At the same time, I know that I'm going nowhere if I don't do anything.

This morning I read a quote about happiness:

"Happiness is a risk. If you’re not a little scared, then you’re not doing it right."

It is taken from a book titled The Peach Keeper, I haven't read that book anyway. Maybe it's true. Maybe it's normal to be scared and doubtful and shaky. I am risking something. The thought that I may risk it for nothing scares me. However, hmm.. I think, I'm going to try my best to not let that happen.