sacha chua :: living an awesome life

I tried to go to sleep earlier than usual last night, and I was hit by a bout of existential angst. (I'm 22. I'm allowed to have existential angst. ;) ) I started wondering what on earth I was doing here, etc.

I think I came to those thoughts because of various heavy things Simon and I had been talking about over the weekend, like the senseless tragedy of the war in Lebanon.

Looking around at my room, I poked fun at my inability to keep things as neatly organized as people here have. I said even after a year in Canada, I still hadn't gotten used to it, and I'd probably make room in my professional budget for managed housing or a housekeeping service.

Reflecting on that further, though, I realized that that weakness of mine wasn't a core part of my identity and that it should never be. I _can_ keep things neat if I take the time to, and if I can't make the time for that, then I should scale back my life until I can.

This led me to think about the difficulties people had around me, and thus the existential angst. With all these problems in the world, what am _I_ doing to help? Is what I'm doing with my research really worth it?

Instead of ignoring it or lying awake thinking about it, I pulled out a flashlight and one of my reflection books. There in brightly-colored markers were all these diagrams showing how I felt about life and what I wanted to do. (Thanks, Diane Lazaro, for giving me a creativity kit!)

In large blue letters, one page read: "I WANT TO TELL STORIES!" With that reminder, everything clicked into place again. I'm doing my master's research in social computing because I want to learn how to effectively tell stories about technology, not just because I want an excuse to stick around in Canada for a while. I'm part of Toastmasters and I'm exploring writing because I want to tell stories.

I want to tell stories because so many people have such interesting stories that can touch the lives of thousands and thousands of other people. I want to draw people's stories out and help them understand themselves more. I want to tell stories that will help people imagine what they can do with technology or how they can improve their relationships with other people.

Maybe that's how I can change the world. =)

I'm glad I drew those diagrams before. I love writing and drawing and talking and thinking. I know I'm going to run into similar questions again and again—I'm human, I forget myself—and having something to go back to gives me great joy.

On Technorati: reflection, purpose

Random Japanese sentence: 虎を大きな猫というなら、同じように猫を小さな虎といってもよい。 You may as well call a cat a small tiger as call a tiger a big cat.

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