Peace.

I was sitting outside on my favourite bench. It was routine. After I clean, I usually go outside to sit on the bench. This time it was different. I sat there watching the birds flying overhead. Some were carrying blades of grass, bits of twigs to build their nests. Some were foraging for food. The sun was warm on my face, and at that moment, I felt peace.

Peace, something that I forgot existed. Peace that employment only promised after retirement. Peace that is to be enjoyed only after a war. Peace that I never knew that one could get, even for a brief moment on this windy, sunny Autumn day.

A thought came to mind, interrupting this peace. My mind decided to ask me, what am I doing with my life? It asked me whether this peace that I am enjoying wasn’t it the comfort that kills dreams?

I had a dream of owning a fleet of vintage German and Italian cars. But that dream died somewhere in my growing up. I had a dream of being a successful filmmaker. But that dream too died somewhere in my growing up. As the birds continued to fly by, my mind and I began having a serious conversation.

Perhaps this peace is the comfort that kills dreams. Because you see, somewhere along the line, my dreams did die. My mind told me that my dreams died the moment I allowed another person to tell me who I am, what I must do, how I must do it and when I must do it. My mind reminded me that the signs that someone was killing my dreams were there, but I chose to ignore them.

My mind reminded me of when I was called in by the academic manager of an institution I worked for to close down my blog. That some students have read my blog, and that they are not happy with my thoughts. I cried in her office.

For about a semester, I could not bring myself to write anything. It was like I was in a mental ICU. I was stuck between writing for a passion and working to survive. Eventually, I chose the former. But the scars of that blow to my being remained.

The creativity and fluidity of how I would write took time to find its equilibrium. And this pattern continued into my new job. This time, they never knew I had a blog. But instead, the work culture, under the guise of “high performance”, demanded every single minute, every single nanosecond of my time. Your time is your life, so at this place, my life was now theirs.

I always, vividly, remember being outside campus. It was during semester break, so the campus was quiet. I remember walking to the back of campus because I felt I was losing my mind. Sitting on the curb, my entire body was shaking. My mind was roaring that this is not what the Creator has created me for. Some would say I was having an anxiety attack. But I know that it was my soul saying Thando, enough is enough.

And so, I quit. I left my job and returned home. It took me over a year since resigning to be at peace with myself. I told my mind this as I sat outside on the bench.

My mind contemplated my words. It said that now we have peace. It is now time to be who I am destined to be. That I control my time. No one can tell me what to do, how to do it, where to do it or when to do it. Life was now fully in my hands.

With that, I stood up and went back into the house, eager to find a pen and paper.