When I was young, I wanted to be a journalist. Or, rather, it was one of the things I wanted to do. In truth, I really didn't know what I wanted to do. I thought I was going to be a medical doctor like my mother. So I took a B.S. in Medical Technology as a pre-cursor to medicine. But after I got my first paycheck, that was the end of medicine for me. Meanwhile, I played piano all my life, took it up till college 'cause music was simply, naturally, a part of me. For as long as I was studying anything, I studied piano along with it, but I never thought of music as a career. I didn't even know there was such a thing as a music profession. For me, music was life, not work, I didn't have to pursue it, so I pursued other things.
But like the musical, "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum", a funny thing happened to me one day. I joined a music competition, The Yamaha Electone Organ Festival, and won the locals in Southern CA, regionals in Northern CA, then the national finals in Texas. Winning First Prize, I got to represent the USA at the International Yamaha Electone Grand Prix Concourse in Japan and I won the Grand Prize! God, I thought, I must be good! It was only then when I took music seriously. I gave up med tech but never gave up my license. I knew, yup, I KNEW, I was going back to it someday. Darn! I wish it was music I wanted to do in life, instead! But I was already doing it so, I guess, it was never ingrained in me to become a musician as a profession.
Well, guess what, music became my profession! I'm proud of it, I love it and, looking back, if there was something I really wished for, is that, I wished I were like those musicians who, at a young age, simply KNEW they wanted to do music when they grew up. And that's why they are where they are - Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Barbra, Beyonce, Oscar Peterson, Chick Corea, and many more, rich and famous or not, doesn't matter! They're making music - living it, loving it!
Actually, I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up - a medical doctor, like my mom! But you know, when I was in college, I was 18, I felt something was missing in medical science. I thought that while medicine kept advancing, as a matter of fact, very rapidly, discovering diseases and cures, it was getting so far removed from its roots. There had to be something that, I thought, KNEW where diseases came from, something had to be there before it dissipated into something else.
As a child, I was always into the origin of things. I always wanted the whole picture, the big picture first. Then, details!
I knew, yes, I knew, someday I'd discover something that explained everything, before and after, from beginning to end, particularly in health and medicine cause I was going to be a doctor, right?
Behold, AYURVEDA!! The first time I ever heard of Ayurveda (Science of Life) was in a conference in Manila my mother and I went to in 1984. It was called PERFECT HEALTH AND REVERSAL OF AGING PROCESS, and it was then when I found the missing link. I knew this was what I was looking for all my life! That's how I became a pioneer of Ayurveda. Dr. Deepak Chopra, M.D., once said, "Western Medicine is good. It is useful, it's effective, especially in trauma, in acute conditions, but it lacks the knowledge."
I knew all along I was right.
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. Now, having knowledge in both Ayurveda and medical science, I'm very proud of it! It gives me a better understanding, deeper awareness, greater appreciation of life and health in Ayurveda, and about health and disease in clinical lab science.
As to journalism, in college, as I said, I felt something was incomplete with medical science, and I was very frustrated, so I decided to take a semester of journalism, thinking that if I was really interested in it, I would simply change courses. I was! But then I got accepted for internship in med tech the next semester. That's how journalism was put on hold, or shall I say, to a halt, along with music.
Writing was one of my passions besides music since I was a little girl. In fact, when I returned home last March, one of the things I did was open old old boxes of family and personal "treasures" - photos, papers, music, etc., sort them out and clean up. And, lo and behold, I discovered about 3 diaries I had since I was a kid up to college. My brother even reminded me that I had a diary named Mon Ami, (where I got that name, I don't even remember), and OMG, I accidentally stumbled into it when I was looking into my old stuff!
In high school, I loved writing. I always did better in written tests than in oral because I was too shy to talk in front of the class. My English teacher once wrote a comment on one of my essays, "You have a deep insight into human nature. Keep it up."
At that age, somehow, I knew what she meant by 'human nature' but I didn't know what 'insight' was. From the context, it meant 'understanding' but, I thought, why didn't she just use the word, understanding, and make it simple. So I asked her, "What is insight, understanding?"
She said, "Yes, but it's deeper than that."
When my dad died in 2000, I started a journal to express my grief. I would write to him and when my brother passed on, too, I continued my writings. I haven't written to them for a while and especially now that I'm blogging, my journal might just become a closed book. No, not really. Somehow, I've always thought, when I finish my journal, when all the pages have been used up, I will go. Well, it's been unused for a while now so that means I've got a long way to go, huh. I intend to live long, anyway, in good health - happy, healthy, wealthy and wise!!
Looking back to my childhood, thinking I didn't know what I wanted to do when I grew up, I realized I knew exactly what I wanted - to be like my mother, a lady physician! However, music was me, still is, and forever it will be. Meanwhile, I loved writing, too. And it's just coming back now and it's coming on strong.
When I learned Ayurveda, I also got interested in Jyotish (Vedic Astrology). Both are parts of the Vedas, the oldest scriptures of ancient India. It was then when I learned that I had both art and science influences in my birth chart!!
That was the awakening!! Everything made sense after that. I realized that nothing in my life was ever wasted. To think that for a long long time, I thought I had no direction in life. Yet, somehow, there was something in me that knew I was good in anything I did. I had great potential that just couldn't seem to express itself fully because of so many... what??
Yes, we are where we are meant to be. There's a reason, there's a season for everything. Yes, I've had regrets, I wished I had done this and that, and not this and that! So many buts and ifs, what ifs, and on and on and on! I've made mistakes and learned my lessons. And I learn something new everyday. But when I was young, I didn't know any better. What I did then was my best, the best I knew how, yes, then.
We grow up, we learn, we move on. "Life is a test. It is only a test." We keep going... Hey, life's too short, we might as well enjoy!
But, seriously, is life really too short? Or, too long?? I think if we live life well, to the best we humanly possibly know how and can, then we will have lived life to the fullest. No cup that is full to the brim is too small or too big. There's an old classic song, "My Cup Runneth Over with Love". No life that brims over is too short or too long.
Wow, all I wanted to talk about was blogging in real-time!
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